Chinesesnuff bottles

The Chinese believed that snuff possessed medicinal qualities and that its use helped to dispel colds, cure migraine, sinus and tooth pain, relieve throat trouble, cause sweats and counter asthma and constipation.  Snuff was believed to be particularly an aid to digestion. Beijing was always the center of snuff usage in China.  The “Hsiang tsu pi chi”, a document written in the early 18th Century, notes that snuff was being manufactured in Beijing at this time.  Mint, camphor and Jasmine were and still are added to snuff in China.
Snuff bottles are made of a wide variety of materials.  These include coral, ivory, jade, jadeite, mother of pearl, lapis lazuli, quartz, malachite, agate, turquoise as well as gold, silver and many more exotic materials.  Despite the number of exotic materials to chose from, glass remained the most popular substance to use and most surviving models are from this material.  Glass was treated much differently by the Chinese during this period than it is today.  The Chinese cut and polished it like a precious stone.  By mixing metal oxides, the subsequent glass could be turned into exquisite glass sculptures.  The glass for these works generally originated in Shantung although the cutting itself was done in Beijing.
The most charming and truly fascinating snuff bottles are those with paintings painted on the interior walls.  These were painted from the inside out through a technique that first painted the interior with iron oxydal mixed with water.  This created a milky white surface suitable to take the paints, which were applied subsequently.  Snuff bottles of this genre include landscapes, flower pieces and other works.  These were created in a day or less of painstakingly intricate brushwork and are truly works of art.  The earliest examples of these date from the 1880s so this form was a relatively late development.
One of the most famous painters of these scenes was Ma Shao-hsuan who worked from 1895 to approximately the mid 1920s.  Other famous artists who worked with snuff bottle paintings were Chou-Lo-yuan, Ting Erh-ch’ung and Yeh Chung-san.  Lesser artists who are mentioned in several of the studies of this form of art are Kuan Yu-t’ien, Po Lang-Ch’en, Pi Chung-su, K’uei Te-t’ien, T’ang Tzu-ch’uan, Meng Tzu-show and Ch’en Chung-san.  By the start of World War II in China, most of the best artists had ceased work.  Many works in present day Beijing markets, of course, date from much more recent dates and in general the quality of these paintings is much inferior to earlier works