As A Trash Collector, I Collected A Imperial Jade Seal

Chapter 56 - 56 Jade Qilin! A Priceless Artifact! (1)

56 Jade Qilin! A Priceless Artifact! (1)

[ Ding! Yongle Sixth Year silver ingot! ]

[ Weight: 50 taels! ]

[ Value: 1.515 million ]

[ Note: the official silver of the sixth year of the Yongle Era. Because of its scarcity, it is one of the most expensive ancient silver ingots! ]

!!

[ Ding! A Jade flute! Material: green-white jade stone! Year: Yongle Era, Value: 3.3 million!]

Following this, Luo Feng found several more silver ingots.

There were five of them in total.

There was also jewelry.

A golden hairpin.

A jade bracelet.

It seemed that it was indeed a chest that stored gold, silver, and treasures.

Luo Feng proceeded to open the second box.

There was actually a gold ingot inside, but because it was a gold ingot from the 22nd year of the Yongle Era, the price was not particularly high.

It was only worth 1.5 million.

This meant that it was worth less than the silver ingots from earlier.

As for the most valuable items in the second box, one of it was a pair of ivory chopsticks. The craftsmanship was quite high and was worth 3.97 million yuan.

There was also a Qilin jade carving made of Hetian jade that was worth more than 10.5 million yuan.

Although these jade artifacts were expensive, Luo Feng felt that it was normal. As the saying goes, gold has a price, jade is priceless.

Moreover, there was artistic processing involved, and thus, it was only natural for the price to be higher.

If a jade Qilin of such workmanship and quality had been in possession of a famous individual or the Emperor, it would undoubtedly be treated as a national treasure.

The celebrity effect was an important factor in deciding the price of antiques.

The other factors would be their artistic value, carving skills, painting skills, and so on.

The last factor was the value of the material.

As long as one of these three factors is present, the antique’s price would skyrocket.

Of course, there was also the market supply factor, whereby if an artifact has no other copy in the world, its price would also be astronomically high.

Back to the treasures that Luo Feng had found both boxes, the items that pleased Luo Feng the most were neither of the carvings mentioned earlier, but rather, the sheer quantity of silver ingots found.

Altogether, the two boxes contained 10 silver ingots from the 6th year of the Yongle Era.

Each of them was worth 1.5 million yuan.

So with 10 of them, he had made 15 million.

“Wow, what a stash of Ming dynasty ingots!”

Wang Yousheng, who had a pair of gloves on, carefully picked up one of the ingots as he inspected it. He was very surprised by what he saw.

“Master Wang, are Ming dynasty ingots very expensive? I remember that our family also had a silver ingot not long ago, but appraisers only evaluated it at a few thousand yuan.”

Luo Feng’s cousin, Luo Yun also made his way over and asked the esteemed appraiser.

“That depends! The era when the ingots are produced would greatly affect their price! Generally, if the economic situation wasn’t good or official ingots were produced in small quantities, then there would be fewer of them in existence and thus, their prices would soar!”

“Well-preserved silver ingots like this, as long as they are from the early Qing dynasty or earlier, are usually worth more than 200 thousand yuan!”

“Just like a few years ago, a silver ingot from the first year of the Yongle Era was sold for a sky-high price of 2.89 million yuan simply due to its scarcity!”

Wang Yousheng was an expert in porcelain.

However, he was also very familiar with other antiques.

“Oh my god, a silver ingot worth 2.89 million? That’s just daylight robbery, ain’t it?”

“How can that sh*t be more expensive than gold ingots?”

“Why? Are those collectors idiots? If they have that kind of money, why don’t they collect a gold ingot instead?”

“I think it’s normal. The rarest silver ingot is from the Wu Zetian era of the Tang dynasty, the 500 taels silver ingot. It is said to be the most expensive ancient silver ingot, and is worth 8 million.”

“That’s true, and the upper limit of gold ingots is even higher! The most expensive gold ingots should be traded for more than 30 million yuan. Everything depends on their age and rarity.”

“…”

After hearing Wang Yousheng’s analysis, Luo Yun was enlightened. He likened it to the collection of paper notes, where their actual value also depended on their rarity.

Not all banknotes with a face value of 100 thousand yuan are valuable, and not all banknotes with a face value of one cent are worthless.

Without thinking too much, Luo Yun directly turned over the official ingot in his hand, and there were characters on the bottom.

“Sixth year of Yongle. Ming dynasty? 50 taels?”

When Luo Yun read those words aloud, Wang Yousheng immediately became excited and exclaimed, “It’s actually from the Yongle period? What a great find! This official ingot should not be cheap!”

“Not cheap?” Luo Yun looked at his cousin in surprise. It seemed that his cousin had struck it rich again?

“Yes, if memory serves, not long ago, an official ingot from the Yongle period sold for over 1.3 million each. But the ones that Little Luo dug up, are obviously much better preserved!” Wang Yousheng looked at Luo Yun’s excited expression and glanced at the box, “Aside from these official ingots, those jade artifacts look valuable too! They are at least worth several million or even tens of millions of yuan!”

Meanwhile, the archeologists who had begrudgingly stayed on site, were also very envious and surprised.

“Huh, this person has struck it rich again!”

“These two boxes are worth at least 10 million yuan!”

...

“Only 10 million? Those official ingots alone are worth 15 million for ten of them!”

“Will their total value exceed 20 million?”

“It’s definitely possible!”

A few days had passed since their initial arrival.

Most of the archeologists had left because Luo Feng truly had no intention of hiring them.

Those that stayed behind were there only to pique their own interests and hobbies, and just like before, they could only observe.

It felt like they were being teased, and it was rather frustrating.

At the same time, they were also very envious of Luo Feng’s luck. With two treasure boxes, he had received a massive windfall.

However, Luo Feng felt that his yield this time was rather average. After all, the natural gold he had found previously had sold for 35 million.

These two boxes contained only silver ingots, a jade Qilin, and a valuable jade flute.

Their total value was only about 33 million.

...

The Jade Qilin was likely the red dot he had seen earlier, and the rest were likely orange dots.

Even after days of excavating the site, these were the most valuable treasures they had found.

Through this, Luo Feng’s theory was more or less confirmed. The flood must have been predicted in advance, and everyone had fled with their valuables beforehand.