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Leave no stone unturned
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Chicken blood stones are valuable in the gem trade due to their rarity and incredible beauty, writes Qu Zhi.
Chicken-blood stones are mined only in China and prized as an ornamental material used for seals and carvings.
The best stones are bright crimson, and the locals who first found them gave the name ji xue shi (鸡血石) because it appeared as though they had been splashed with the blood of a freshly slaughtered chicken.
The stones can only be found in Changhua Town near Hangzhou and Balin in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
“Unlike other stones, you can’t display a chicken-blood stone otherwise it will lose the color,” says Wu Songlin, a gemstone collector. “So you just take it out to enjoy for a while and then put it back in the box immediately. But even for such a short time, it is satisfying.”
While known as chicken-blood stones around the world, they are actually soapstones. The only difference is the presence of cinnabar, a bright red mineral consisting of mercury sulfide.
A stone will appear more red if it has a higher content of cinnabar. The reddest stones are rarer, thus more expensive — prices can reach hundreds of million yuan for an uncarved stone — and prized by collectors.
The cinnabar in soapstones oxidizes easily in sunlight, thus even the richest red stones will darken or become black within half a year if they are not stored out of sunlight.
Red also symbolizes good luck in Chinese culture. The color has remained very popular from ancient days to modern times and is another reason why the stones have stayed so desirable.
“Among all the stones, I think Changhua chicken-blood stones boast the most beautiful color of red,” says Wu, who followed in his grandfather’s footsteps and started collecting gemstones as a child.
The stones can be used to make seals or sculptures although Wu prefers seals.
“Only the best chicken-blood stones can be selected for seals because there can’t be any crack on it and it still needs to have a beautiful pattern,” he says.
Cracked stones are best for sculptures since the sculptor can cover up the crack by carving that particular area of the stone.
In 1972, when China and Japan re-established diplomatic relations, then Premier Zhou Enlai gave Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka a pair of chicken-blood seal stones from Changhua. The stones became famous worldwide soon after. Collectors then swarmed China’s mainland in the 1990s looking for the stones.
During the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), nobles and refined scholars started to collect chicken-blood stones for use as a seal. During the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), emperors and their concubines all chose chicken blood stones as a seal stone.
The best stones usually come from Changhua. In this small town, about 70 percent of the locals are in the soapstone business. Every day nearly 3,000 miners go out digging in hopes of finding the one stone that will make them rich.
Villagers are only allowed to dig in the nearest mine, which prevents masses of people from scouring the area. In the past, villages have disputed the rights to mines, leading to some deaths.
Mechanized mining has desolated some of the mountains in Changhua and many of the area’s mines are reportedly near exhausted.
Mine 207 was legendary for its chicken-blood stones. Experts have said it had consistently produced the best-quality chicken-blood stones. From 1958 to 1962 a large number of chicken-blood stones was mined, however they were mostly used to refine mercury. Collectors today regret the loss of so many stones.
Even today at auctions, if a chicken-blood stone is tagged from this mine is considered a mark of high quality.
Balin in Inner Mongolia has some new mines where some high-quality stones have been found recently. However, the chicken-blood stones from Balin tend to be more transparent, not as red as those from Changhua and the color fades easier.
Changhua locals enjoy sharing some legends about chicken-blood stones with visitors. One goes that two golden pheasants once flew from Jiuhua Mountain in Anhui Province to Changhua. One day one was bitten by a snake and its blood seeped into the cracks of the mountain, creating chicken-blood stones.
Other villagers say the crimson color of the stones comes from the blood of a phoenix that fought bravely to protect the locals from catastrophe.
Collector Wu says about six years ago he visited Changhua looking for chicken-blood stones. He remembers finding one measuring 2cm by 2cm by 7.5cm, featuring a rich crimson color covering most of the stone and an irregular rounded top. Even better, it had not been carved, Wu says.
The dealer was asking 600,000 yuan (US$97,851) for the stone, Wu says.
“It was too expensive,” he says, taking the stone out of a box. “I went back on six occasions over a period of time trying to negotiate a cheaper price. But the dealer didn’t drop the price. One day, I gave in and bought it.
“I’m glad I did. The color haunted me so much that I couldn’t fall asleep at night. Now the stone is worth at least 3 million yuan!” Wu says.
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