Hookah: a new plaything in the collector's market

During the Wanli period of Sun Qiming in Yinchuan, Ningxia, tobacco began to flow into China from West and Central Asia, and it spread quickly. In the Qing Dynasty, smoking was more popular. The way of smoking is also divided into water, drought, and snuff. The northerners mainly smoke dry tobacco, while the southerners mostly use water pipes. It is more popular in Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Yunnan, Sichuan, Guizhou, Hunan, Hubei, Anhui and other places. . Hookah has become a product of this era.

The structure of a hookah is generally composed of a pipe, a straw, a water pipe, a tobacco bin, and a hand rest. It can be cast as a whole or can be separated. Its function is to dilute the irritation of tobacco, so that the smoke will be filtered in the water, and the taste will become more mellow and mild, which is convenient for smoking. Later it evolved into a status symbol, and was once a smoking tool for high-ranking officials and wealthy people. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, people who smoked with hookahs were usually shopkeepers or gentry. Empress Dowager Cixi is also a hookah smoker. Among her funeral objects are copper and silver hookahs with multiple handles.

The material of hookah is mostly white copper, but also brass, red copper, bamboo and wood, silver, aluminum, porcelain and other textures. Their shapes are flat, diamond, round, hexagon, trumpet, etc. The decorations carved on the pipes are mostly based on patterns such as Songhe Yannian, Bamboo Reporting Peace, Carp Jumping into Dragon Gate, or Landscape Figures. The craftsmanship is mostly cloisonne, hollowed out, and overcast, and the subject matter of the picture is very wide. A beautifully crafted hookah often combines practicality, artistry and history. A pot can show many traditional Chinese techniques such as copper carving, calligraphy, painting, inlaying, and enamel burning, which contains elegance and interest.

Nowadays, the hookah has gradually disappeared as an appliance to filter the smell of smoke, and it has become a kind of art for people to enjoy and collect. At present, the price of a brass hookah is about 200-500 yuan, and the price of a cupronickel hookah is 300-1,000 yuan. Under the premise of different materials and crafts, the price of a hookah with a peculiar shape and special material is more than 2,000 yuan. The various types of hookahs produced in the Ming and Qing dynasties not only fully reflect our country's more than a thousand years of smoking equipment manufacturing level and history of changes in use, but also a true portrayal of our country's different periods, different regions and different ethnic cultures and folk customs.