Eleven ivory pieces inscribed with ancient characters, which were closely guarded for more than 70 years in Yancheng City in Jiangsu Province, were put up for auction on November 27 for 58 million yuan (about US$7.2 million) by the Beijing Red Sun International Auction Company. The start price was 30 million yuan (about US$3.7 million).

The ivory pieces were kept in eleven silk boxes. Time had turned the originally white pieces a light yellow. The pieces are irregularly shaped: the largest one is about 40 centimeters long, while the smallest one is about 20 centimeters long. Each piece is engraved with dozens of ancient characters. The engravings are thicker and deeper than those found on oracle bones of the Shang Dynasty (c.1600 - 1700 BC), and they are more intricate and artistic.

Liu Huanjing, the owner of the ivories, said these ivories were passed down from his grandfather. His grandfather, an avid collector or curios, was an industrialist in 1930s' Shanghai. Liu's grandfather bought the pieces from a friend. He then left them to Liu's mother upon his death. During the "Cultural Revolution", Liu's mother put the ivories in an earthen jar and buried it in their yard to avoid being searched by the Red Guard.

Liu took the pieces to the Geography Research Institute of Nanjing University in 2002 to have them dated. Carbon-14 tests showed that the ivories were about 6,760 years old.

According to his appraisal, Lei Congyun, the former director of the Chinese Cultural Relics Exchange Center of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, said that the ancient characters were probably carved into the ivories during the Shang (c.1600 - 1100 BC) or Zhou (c.1100 BC - 221 BC) dynasties. Lei added that characters of this nature were only found on tortoise shells or animal bones.

This is the first time that they have been found on ivory.

(China.org.cn by Chen Lin, November 28, 2005)