A mandarin square, or rank badge, buzi, made with couched embroidery on a brown satin ground. It is made in two equal sized sections and sewn together along one selvedge, thus intended for the front of a court surcoat. It depicts a silver pheasant, the emblem of rank of a civil official of the fifth rank. The bird, worked in silver-coloured metal-wrapped thread, save for its beak and legs (where gold-coloured thread couched with green silk thread is used), is looking upwards towards a red sun in the top left hand corner. The sun is realised in small coral beads, couched in a concentric circle.
Surrounding the bird are gold clouds, and dotted about are many symbolic motifs, including five copper-coloured bats, a fan, a gourd and a mystic knot. The sea is depicted using converging diagonal lines. The imagery is framed with a silver-coloured flower blossom (a chrysanthemum ?) and gold-coloured linked spirals. The square is lined with a tabby woven blue silk. [Textile]
textile; rank insignia; Mandarin square
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Collection Information
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