Jade dragon pendant, carved in high relief: the body coils over itself, the scales are hollowed one by one, whiskers and claws stand clear of the ground.
Drilled and delivered bare, with no cord and no chain. Take a slightly thick cord: the weight bears on the drill hole, and too fine a thread saws the stone over time.
No metal touches the stone: it is weighable, and the figure will be published here with its date. Treatment status not determined.
A jade dragon pendant carved in high relief: the body coils over itself, the scales are cut one by one, the whiskers and the claws stand clear of the ground. The green is clear, lighter on the ridges of the relief, denser in the hollows. The piece is drilled and delivered bare.
In four lines
Carving in high relief, scales cut out, whiskers and claws standing clear.
Drilled and delivered bare: no metal, no glue, no cord supplied.
Bare stone, therefore weighable: the figure will be published here, with its date.
A deep relief chips at its fine edges: that is where it needs protecting.
A high relief, and what it demands of the material
On this piece, the carver went far below the surface: the dragon’s body passes behind itself, the whiskers stand clear of the ground, and the scales are hollowed one by one. That work is only possible on a very tough material.
Jade owes its toughness to a structure of interlocking crystals that stops a crack from spreading: that is what made polished axes possible in the Neolithic, and that is what allows a claw to be freed here without the piece splitting. Its hardness, on the other hand, stays ordinary, 6.5 to 7 for jadeite. The difference between hardness and toughness.
The practical consequence, and it counts on this piece more than on any other in the catalogue: it is the fine edges that suffer. A knock will not split the dragon, it will chip a whisker or the tip of a claw. A pouch for it alone, and not at the bottom of a bag.
The hollows and the reliefs, and what to look at there
The green looks lighter on the ridges and denser in the hollows. That contrast is optics, not a clue: on any carved and polished stone, the bumps return the light and the hollows stay in shadow.
What would deserve attention is different: a colour that follows a network of cracks rather than the shape, or that concentrates at the bottom of the chisel hollows, where a dye lodges best. On this piece, the green advances in broad, irregular patches, which is the opposite of the warning signal, without proving anything for all that. The treatment status stays not determined. The checks that need no equipment.
It is delivered bare, and it will need a cord
The piece is drilled with two holes and arrives with no cord and no chain. It is a choice I flag rather than leave you to discover: any braided jewellery cord suits, and it can be replaced when it wears, which always happens before the stone moves. Thread and cord on a jade piece.
On a heavy carved piece, take a slightly thick cord: the weight bears on the drill hole, and too fine a thread saws the stone over time. Warm water, a mild soap, a very soft brush for the hollows. Never ultrasonic, never steam, never solvent: since the treatment status is unknown, any resin would not stand it. Care in detail.
Why I write jade dragon pendant, and not simply green stone dragon
Because the word jade on its own does not say much, and because the dragon is precisely the motif most often carved in something else. What is sold under this name is very often serpentine, labelled “new jade” or “Korean jade”, or dyed quartzite, sold as “Malaysia jade”. None of those names designates jade.
Serpentine is also much softer, around 3 to 4 on the Mohs scale against 6.5 to 7 for jadeite, which makes it easier to carve: that is one of the reasons it dominates the market for heavily worked pieces. Here the scale will settle it, because the stone is bare. I weigh, I do not certify.
Additional information
Stone
Jadéite
Colour
Clear green
Stone shape
Carving in the round
Motif
Dragon
Mounting
None
Metal
None
Setting
Drilled stone
Worn by
Unisex
Paired stones
None, jade only
Mineral family
Sodium aluminium pyroxene
Hardness (Mohs)
6.5 to 7
Reference density
3.25 to 3.36 g/cm³
Toughness
Exceptional, interlocking crystals
Treatment
Not determined
Origin
Outside Burma, country of extraction not confirmed
What tradition attributes to the jade dragon
What follows changes register, and I flag it rather than blending it into the rest of the page. None of it is proven. These are customs and beliefs, old and documented, which I report because they are part of the history of this stone and of this motif. No piece of jewellery in this shop is sold as a treatment, and I claim no effect for this one.
The Chinese dragon is not the Western oneThe Chinese long is a creature of water and sky, tied to rain and to rivers, without the treasure-guarding role or the evil charge of the European dragon. The two figures do not share a history.
An emblem of rankUnder the imperial dynasties, the number of claws on the dragon was regulated by the rank of whoever wore it. It is one of the rare cases where the iconography of jade is documented by administrative texts.
A stone of moral virtueIn Confucian thought, jade is associated with qualities of character rather than effects on the body: uprightness, constancy, restraint. It is the best documented meaning of them all.
The dragon and jadeThe motif is attested on Chinese jades from the Neolithic, long before it became the imperial emblem we know. Its ancient C shape, moreover, looks nothing like this one.
Dispatched within 48 hours of your order being confirmed, for delivery within 14 days from dispatch. I keep no buffer stock, and I won’t promise a timeframe I couldn’t meet.
Postage charges
€6.99 to any destination, free on orders of €47 or more to France, Belgium, Switzerland and Luxembourg. The exact amount appears in the cart before you pay.
The packaging, and why it matters
Every piece ships in its own pouch, kept apart from the others. This isn’t about presentation: the hardness of jade is ordinary, between 6 and 6.5 for nephrite and 6.5 to 7 for jadeite, and the quartz in everyday dust sits at 7. Two pieces of jewellery that travel together end up scratching each other.
Fourteen days to change your mind
With no need to explain yourself. An email is enough to open a return, there is no form to fill in. Return postage is at your expense, unless the piece doesn’t match its listing or arrives damaged.
Warm water, mild soap, a soft cloth. A very soft brush for the hollows of a carving. That’s all, and it’s enough.
What you must never do, and why
No ultrasonic cleaner, no steam, no solvent, no heat source. This isn’t a token precaution: the treatment status of my pieces is not established. My supplier doesn’t know, and weighing establishes the mineral without saying anything about a possible resin impregnation. Resin tolerates neither heat nor solvents, so every piece is handled as though it might contain some. The information sheet on treatments.
Scratches, and where they come from
Jade is tough, meaning very hard to break: its interlocking crystal structure resists fracturing, and that is why axes could be shaped from it in the Neolithic. Its hardness, on the other hand, is ordinary, 6 to 6.5 for nephrite and 6.5 to 7 for jadeite. The quartz in everyday dust sits at 7: that is what dulls jade, not knocks. The difference between the two.
Day to day
Put the piece on after perfume and cream, never before. Take it off for housework, gardening and sport, where the knocks against corners happen. Store each piece on its own, in its pouch. On a strand of beads, the thread wears out before the stone: it gets restrung, and there is nothing abnormal about that.
My name is Jade. I’m French, from Morbihan, and based in Tallinn. I choose the pieces and have them set: I mine nothing, I cut nothing, and I don’t do the metalwork myself. The work I do is the sorting, and with this material that is what decides everything.
I am neither a gemmologist, nor a lapidary, nor a therapist, and I don’t claim to be.
I weigh, I don’t certify
Before putting a reference online, I order one example of it for myself. When it reaches me unset, I weigh it in air, then suspended from a thread in a glass of water: the ratio of the two masses gives the density, and that figure separates jadeite, nephrite, serpentine and dyed quartzite without ambiguity.
One example per reference, not every piece. I don’t handle the piece that goes out to you, and I would rather say so than let you believe otherwise. The method, with its three limits.
What I can’t know
The treatment status of my pieces. My supplier doesn’t know, and the scales say nothing about it: they establish the mineral, not the resin impregnation. Only infrared spectroscopy in a laboratory would settle it, and I don’t have that done. So you will never read “jadeite A”, “type A” or “untreated” on this site. The information sheet.
Where my jade comes from
No Burmese jadeite, and the first reason is a legal one. Not the reason you read everywhere: the JADE Act of 2008 did indeed ban these stones in the United States, but that ban was lifted on 7 October 2016. What applies today dates from 8 April 2021: the US Treasury sanctioned Myanma Gems Enterprise, the state-owned company that controls the Burmese gem trade. So there is no general ban, but an American is not allowed to trade with that entity, and a stone never tells you where it has passed through. One single supply chain for ten markets: it has to hold up for the most demanding of them. When an origin isn’t confirmed to me in writing, the listing doesn’t state it. My sourcing policy.
