THREE FINELY EMBROIDERED FRAGMENTS OF AN IMPERIAL YELLOW KESI DRAGON ROBE, CHINA, around 1800. The very fine kesi silk brocades display five-clawed dragons in gold-wrapped threads, each pursuing a flaming pearl amidst five-coloured ruyi-shaped clouds and bats. Emerging from the lishui, among the Mountains of Immortality, the Eight Precious Treasures 'ba bao' as symbols of wealth and fortune: the pair of square-shaped golden ornaments, the pair of round-shaped golden ornaments, scrolls, the musical stone, the pair of rhinoceros horns, the red coral, ingot, the wan Symbol and the ruyi sceptre. The lack of vents as well as the description of the chao pao assigned to the empress from the catalogue Huangchao liqi tushi identify these fragments as a part of a robe worn by a female member of the imperial family, probably the empress herself. - Property formerly from a European private collection, acquired prior 1992 - Cf. with a similar dragon robe from the Victoria and Albert Museum (museum number T.43-1952) - Minor traces of age, the lower part stained