Sotheby's Ho♕ng Kong, 27th April 2003, lot 1. 

香港蘇富比2003年4月27日，編號1

A Romance with Jade: From the De An Tang Collection, Yongshougong, Palace Museum, Beijing, 2004, cat. no⛎. 114.

《玉緣：德安堂藏玉》，永壽宮，故宮博物院，北京，2004年，編號114

Carved from white jade, the bowl has a straight rim and thick walls and is inscribed at the centre on the underside with the character bing [third class]. The Qianlong Emperor personally ranked the jades in his possession, having them or their wood stands inscribed with such characters as jia, yi, bing, ding to indicate various ranks. Inscribed with the character bing, the lot on offer is an example of this practice.

This bowl is undecorated and showcases the beautiful translucency of its raw jade. The jade-obsessed Qianlong developed unique insights into jades and advocated the principle of “fine jade is not to be carved,” in accordance with the Confucian virtues of benevolence, loyalty, wisdom, courage, and moral purity associated with jade. Even before ascending the throne, Qianlong [then Prince Hongli] had written a fu rhapsody on 'Fine jade as a metaphor for the gentleman': “How brilliant the uncarved jade, its essence contained. How lustrous the fine jade, how luminous and translucent. The nourished forest is small yet elegant in its concentration. The shining peaks billow in their heroic majesty. Your virtuous qualities, unmatched, I compare to the gentleman’s moral purity. Dyed but unsullied, you retain your unadorned plainness. Modest but unblemished, you are as unyielding as from the first. The gui is auspicious, superior to ordinary stone. Worn as an accessꦅory, jade elevates worn clothing. Jade, used in rituals, blesses with plentiful harvests. With a dazzling aura, it emanates light. Gentle and refined, it possesses the virtues in equal measure. Comparing himself to jade, the gentleman finds in it a mirror image. Warm and lustrous in its form, dense and impenetrable in its nature, jade is unpolluted with even a speck a dust and has no equal. Translucent all around its body, it shines with a dazzling halo. How can one take the uncarved jade as unfinished, and take its absence of blemishes as a flaw!”

盌白玉質，直口、厚壁，底中央刻「丙」字。

乾隆帝愛玉，親ꦰ自為所愛器物鑒定、定級，欽定甲乙丙等字樣，刻於器物或木座之上，此盌底所刻「丙」字即為一例。

此盌玉質晶瑩溫潤，通體光素無紋飾。乾隆愛玉成癖，賞玉見🃏解獨特，提倡「良玉不琢」，以玉之五德仁、義、智、勇ꦺ、潔為根本。弘曆早在繼大統前已作《良玉比君子賦》：「焜彼太璞，有韜其精。蘊茲良玉，爾晶爾瑩。潤林薄兮凝秀，輝岡巒兮挺英。伊美德之莫匹，吾將配君子之潔清。爾乃涅而不緇，素有餘也。廉而不劌，堅如初也。珪以為瑞，軼碔砆也。佩以致飾，章衣袽也。庇蔭嘉穀，用弘敷也。氣比白虹，光發舒也。文質彬彬，德均如也。君子比之，於焉自鏡。溫潤其形，密栗其性。一塵不雜，無疵類之可尋，全體胥瑩，有光華之交瑛。夫何大璞之不完，而匿瑕之為病哉！」