Chinese snuff bottles: the “Five Roosters Collection”

This collection focuses mainly on real snuff bottles, namely bottles made in the period in which the habit of snuffing tobacco was in use in China, which means from early 18th century until early 20th century. Therefore, bottles meant for display are excluded, except the inside painted glass ones, which are a few here. Today’s market is full of fancy bottles, made for attracting uneducated tourists, which use is practically impossible. Real snuff bottles were meant to be handled and carried in the pouch; thus, the right shapes are simple. Their fascination resides in the elegance of shapes, or the fineness of the decoration, denoting a fine taste. A good bottle fits perfectly in your hand; the tactile feeling is of great importance and a surprisingly pleasant experience to whom are not used to handle them. Many of the best bottles are excellent examples of what is meant by the Japanese word “shibui”: the elegance of simplicity, the purity of shapes. This is especially true for the old bottles, because they were made for the high, educate classes of Literati and Court officials.

The quality of the bottles in this collection ranges from popular to imperial bottles, all selected according to our personal taste. We aim to offer the observer an overview of the qualitative and artistic varieties, as well as materials and techniques, of the world of snuff bottles. Something that is not possible to have either through a collection based only on high quality bottles or only on popular ones.

t is worth to spend a few words about the dating. The historical documentation about these objects is very scarce. This could mean that, consequently, also knowledge and competence within this area are relatively scarce if compared to other areas of Chinese Art; this is one of the reasons why the same bottle can in fact be sold at a very high price at an auction, and at a much lower price one year later, even by the same auction house. It is a strange market where, because of lack of sure dating references, the provenance is often important (although frankly overrated in our opinion). Most of the lots offered by the major auction houses are simply dated as Qing dynasty, and only a few are dated to 18th (where sometimes the Imperial attribution is a bit abused in our opinion) or 19th century. This is because, in this field, we do not have sure ways of dating, like archaeological excavations, shipwreck recoveries, tomb finds, and so on, as it happens for Chinese ceramics, where written documentation, archaeological excavations, export reports etc. are abundant. It should be borne in mind that, as said above, real snuff bottles have occupied a relatively short time frame within the long history of China. They have been made within about two hundred years only.

Hence, the dating mostly relies on style and quality. Apparently subtle differences in overall shape, form and finish of the foot, base, neck, hollowing, material and working methods, all these clues contribute to a probably reliable dating. Just these subtle details, such like a particular shaping of the foot or its finishing, are source of great satisfaction when they are found in our new acquisition.

Collecting Chinese snuff bottles is a source of continuous wonders. It is a rewarding area of interest which grants pleasures, stories, unexpected achievements, and lead us to meet nice people. It will be an endless discover of techniques, materials, and wonders about the surprising creativity of unknown artisans.

The Mangialupo Collection.

Note about the images: All the photographs were taken with the same set-up, in order to provide the correct display of the real dimensional ratio among the various bottles. Thanks to this, by looking at the index pages of each category, the observer has the same view as those who are observing the collection live.