Karen Mitchell, age 13, of Baton Rouge, La., for her question:
WHAT EXACTLY IS JADE?
Jade is a tough, hard and highly colored stone that is used widely for fine carvings and jewelry. Two minerals, jadeite and nephrite, are classified as jade. Their chief colors are green and white.
Jadeite, or Chinese jade, is a rare jade mineral, found mainly in Burma, Japan, California and Mexico. It is more valuable than nephrite because of its beautiful colors, such as light green or lilac. Once in a while, small amounts of a transparent emerald green colored jadeite are found in boulders.
The best quality of jadeite is very valuable and also expensive.
Nephrite, the chief source of jade, was the mineral which the early Chinese used for carving. At that time, it came from Turkestan. Today, it comes chiefly from New Zealand.
Nephrite deposits also have been found in Wyoming and Alaska.
The principal jade cutting centers are in China. The mineral is translucent to opaque and comes in a wide range of colors, including dark green, white, yellow, gray, red and black.
Most valuable type of nephrite is a green jade called spinach jade.
Jade minerals have a peculiar structure of interlocking meshes of fine needles that make them very strong and suitable for carving into delicate patterns and thin implements. Nephrite tools were found in the Lake Dweller remains of the New Stone Age in Europe and Central America.
During the days of ancient Chinese civilization, jade took the place of gold and other precious stones. The Chinese carved it into jewelry and also buried it with their dead.
Many beautiful jade carvings, dating from 1400 B.C., have been dug from ruins of Anyang, the capital of the first Chinese dynasty.
Through the years, the Chinese developed new sources of the mineral jade and improved their carving techniques. Jade carving reached its height during the Ming Dynasty, which ran from 1368 until 1644. The carvings of this period are treasured by collectors.
The Ming Dynasty was a period of Chinese rule between two foreign conquests. It was preceded by the Mongol Empire and followed by the Manchu Dynasty. Ming rulers restored traditional institutions, such as the civil service, which the Mongols had suspended.
Ming means bright in Chinese, and the period was important especially in the arts. Ming architects built the imperial palace, which is in the Forbidden City of Peking, now called Beijing. Many buildings from this period are still standing.
In addition to beautifully carved jade, the artists of this period also produced fine bronze and lacquerware.
Western traders came to China for the first time during the Ming Dynasty. The Chinese at this time also welcomed Jesuit missionaries from Europe.