A historically scarce natural resource of limited normal distribution further enhanced in value when worked or carved into elaborate objects.
Jade is chemically and visually variable within deposits, making it difficult to assign trade goods to their origin. Ancient and modern artisans often imported jade and other greenstones from the same deposits interchangeably. Mineralogists identify jade as nephrite (actinolite or tremolite) or jadeite (which is more complex and variable chemically). Iron contributes to the green color in nephrite and the green or blue color of jadeite. Chrome provides an apple green color in jadeite.
Although true jadeite is quite rare worldwide, nephrite and jadeite mixed with other chemicals are more common. True jadeite occurs in California, Russia, Japan, Burma, and the Motagua River valley of Guatemala. Jadeite mixed with other chemicals is found in the Dominican Republic, Colombia, California, Canada, Corsica, Italy, and New Caledonia. Nephrite, but not jadeite, occurs in China, and there are other nephrite deposits elsewhere, including in Siberia.
Prehistorically in Central America, the Olmec, Mayan, and Costa Rican elite used highly crafted, imported jadeite as jewelry, offerings, and ultimately grave goods to demarcate their high rank. Trade likely took place as gift and ritual exchange to develop and maintain foreign relations, although long-distance traders, perhaps at the behest of the elite, sometimes included jade in their cargos. Jade was likely traded from mines along the Motagua River area of Guatemala. Olmec jade artifacts were traded to the Mayan area and to Costa Rica. Jade was a favored trade good for roy alty of the Mayan civilization. The largest Mayan jade object is a nine-pound carved head of the Sun god Kinich Ahau found in a burial tomb at Altun Ha, Belize.
The ancient Chinese regarded jade as a symbol of immortality, wealth, and virtue, valuing it higher than gold or silver. Until recently, most Chinese nephrite was obtained from the Xinjiang region of China. Not until the eighteenth century were other sources used, notably jadeite mines in Burma and nephrite from Siberia. From early use of jade beads in Neolithic burials to more elaborate figurines, zoomorphic pendants, and other objects of later Shang, Zhou, and Han Chinese dynasties, jade was traded over long distances. Foreign trade in jade reached its height during the Tang dynasty (618–907 C.E.), because of military control and improvement of transportation, with the reopening of the Silk Road, which dated to the Han dynasty.
The allure of jade continues because of its scarcity as a resource and difficulty to manufacture. Private companies export jade from British Columbia, Canada, to Asia for manufacture into figurines that are reimported for sale. Collectors have long desired jade artifacts. Antiquities traded both legally and illegally often fetch high prices. The UNESCO Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export, and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, which the United States signed in 1982, restricts the import and export of jade.
Heather McKillop
See also: Archaeology; Art; China; Chinese Dynasties; Gold; Illegal Trade; Mayan Civilization; Silk Road; Silver.
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