by The identification of furniture is early or late, and sometimes can be judged by the manufacturing method of some components.
Although it is not very reliable to judge by the manufacturing method alone, it has certain reference value.
Of course, in any case, it is not appropriate to judge only by one component, but by combining its overall shape and the manufacturing method of other components.
The identification characteristics of furniture components mainly include the following categories: the middle part of the head of the back chair and the comb back chair is higher (such as the 23rd and 25th of Ehrlich’s Chinese Furniture), which is later than the same kind of chair.
The head of the back chair intersects with the lattice angle at the upper end of the back leg, which is a common method of building in Cantonese style.
If it is made in Guangzhou, its era is much later.
The Ming style chairs made in Suzhou are mostly made of tenon and tenon of cigarette bags, which are of an earlier age.
▲ In the 16th and 17th centuries, the high-back south official hat chair of Huanghuali was built with the Soviet style drawer tray chair stool and the bed drawer tray, both soft and hard.
The soft drawers are made of palm, rattan or other animal and plant fibers, while the hard drawers are made of wood boards (generally made of grooved boards), including the hard drawers covered with wooden straw mats that have been refitted in recent years.
In his book “Chinese Furniture”, Ehrlich mistakenly believed that pasting mat drawers was one of the two basic methods of making ancient Chinese seat furniture, which was certainly wrong.
However, he believed that soft drawers and hard drawers were of reference significance for the identification of the age of furniture, and in some cases they were right.
Because of the exquisite furniture in the early Ming and Qing dynasties, most of them were the products of Suzhou from the 16th century to the early 18th century.
Most of the drawers were soft drawers, and only a few were hard drawers.
Therefore, if we encounter the soft drawer furniture that is well woven with palm rattan, or the hard drawer furniture that has been damaged and converted into straw mat veneer (the perforation on the edge can be verified), we can think it is probably the product of Suzhou.
▲ In the 16th and 17th centuries, yellow pear circle chairs and rattan woven soft drawers.
On the contrary, if we encounter a tray with grooved boards and no perforation on the edges, that is to say, it is always hard drawer furniture, then it is probably not made in Suzhou, but in Guangzhou or other areas.
To determine the age of furniture, we can make a better judgment on its age and origin by examining the method of making drawers and trays, and combining the wood and manufacturing techniques used.
The tooth-strip table made of several tooth-strips and a wooden waist is earlier than the two wooden parts, that is, the “fake two upper” is earlier than the “real two upper”.
The straight tooth bar, or the round outline of the “Watang belly” in the middle of the tooth bar (such as Ike’s “Tukao” plate 2), is earlier than that of the “Watang belly” which is stiff and straight (such as Ike’s “Tukao” plate 6, left and 28).
“Watang belly”, like the relief of five precious beads, is even later.
▲ In the 18th century, the rosette chair with yellow pear mullions, which is the front tooth of the “Watang belly” chair, has only one straight tooth, or a small tooth head.
It is a Guangzhou-style manufacturing method, and its era is relatively late.
The teeth under the Ming-style teeth made by the Soviet Union are longer, or fall straight to the foot tent, and become the mouth teeth of the voucher, which is an earlier era.
The tooth head of the tooth-head collet tenon and bar table was made especially wide and bulky.
It was made after the middle of the Qing Dynasty (such as Ehrlich’s Chinese Furniture, 58).
▲ In the middle of the Qing Dynasty, the elm collet tenon and flat head table, the wide tooth-headed tent and the cauldron tent are small and stiff in curvature, and there is no roundness and naturalness (such as the 44th and 48th pages of the Koci Furniture Book), which is relatively late (Figure 1).
The explicit style of the pin account uses the direct account.
After the middle of the Qing Dynasty, the common use of the compass account (such as Ike’s “Tukao”, plate 6, left, and Koci’s furniture book, 95) (Figure 2) is more popular in the late Soviet style.
It is quite reliable to distinguish the Ming style from the Qing style.
There are several common patterns of clip flower in Ming style, such as several rings, auspicious grass, cloud patterns, longevity characters, square wins, flat circles, etc., which are beautiful and sparse, with good decoration effect.
After the middle of the Qing Dynasty, the clippings became more and more numerous, some of which resulted in flowers and fruits, some of which resulted in flat square carved plates or hollowed-out Ruyi heads (such as Curtis Furniture Book No.
46, Ehrlich’s “Chinese Furniture” No.
116) (Fig.
3), but the effect was not good.
According to the pattern of the clip flower, the Ming and Qing styles can also be distinguished, and its approximate age can be determined.
In addition to the straight feet, the legs and feet of Ming style furniture have bulging legs, fangs, three curved legs, and other legs and feet that turn inward or outward.
The lines are all natural and smooth, and they are full of strength and softness.
By the middle of the Qing Dynasty, they were affectating and making meaningless bends.
The late Soviet style became worse every time.
The commonly used method is to make straight feet with large materials, cut a section below the middle, bend suddenly inward, and then bend outwards above the horse’s hoof.
It is almost the same from the big chair like a throne to several desks.
It is hard and vulgar, and the simple and concise style of the Ming style is lost (Figure 4).
In recent years, some people have said that this kind of large chair made in Suzhou in the late Qing Dynasty, which is made of the back foot as a meaningless bend, also inherits the fine tradition of the Ming Dynasty.
This argument does not conform to the facts and is harmful to the development of furniture in China in the future.
Horseshoe There are significant differences between the Ming style and the Qing style horseshoes.
The former revolves inward or outward, with beautiful and sharp outline, while the latter degenerates into rectangular or square shape, often with palindrome carving, which is vulgar and rigid (Figure 5).
It can be said that the difference between the Ming and Qing dynasties is not satisfactory.
The red sandalwood table in the Summer Palace is light all over, but according to its square horseshoe, it is definitely the product of the middle of the Qing Dynasty| Source: Cultural Wealth Weekly | | Editor: Home of Furniture in the Ming and Qing Dynasties |.
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