Period: Warring State period (475-221 BCE)
Measurements: L. 15.2 cm
Provenance: Unearthed from the tomb at Xiaotun of Xigong, Luoyang, 1987
   
Being white in color due to corrosion underground, the pendant is roughly S-shaped in the form of a dragon. With mouth opening, the dragon has an arched body carved with groove design and a perforation in the center, and its tail raised. It was presumably worn along with other jade articles as ornaments.
   
Followed the removal of the capital eastward to Luoyang by King Ping of Zhou, the Central Plains became the political center of the time, accordingly economy boomed thereafter. Therefore the sites of various handicraft workshops including the carving of jade, stone, were discovered inside the massive ruin of the Eastern Zhou capital. The excavation site in the Xigong district of Luoyang is the key area of the Eastern Zhou mausoleum, surrounded by grand burials and chariot and horse pits of the Eastern Zhou dynasty in the adjacent area. During the transitional period of the Spring and Autumn and the Warring States period, great social changes successively took place in the vassal states of the Central Plains, the “ritual jade” funeral principle of the Shang and Zhou tombs waned, jade pendants with artistic values gained popularity among the aristocrats as ornaments not only for daily life but also for burials, which resulted in the thriving jade handicraft industry.