A RARE ARCHAISTIC GOLD AND SILVER-INLAID BRONZE ANIMAL-FORM VESSEL

SONG/MING DYNASTY

Details

A RARE ARCHAISTIC GOLD AND SILVER-INLAID BRONZE ANIMAL-FORM VESSEL
Song/Ming Dynasty
The stocky mythical beast with a small aperture in its mouth shown standing foursquare and staring straight ahead with bulging eyes, cast in relief with spirals on the haunches and wings on the flanks below a hinged cover decorated with further wings centering the back below a stylized bird finial, the neck encircled by a collar and the chest with a raised panel decorated with a taotie mask repeated at the top of the long, curved tail, all inlaid in gold and silver with archaistic designs reserved against the dark olive-brown patina
13in. (34.2cm.) long

Lot Essay

Compare two other gold and silver-inlaid bronze animal-form vessels dated to the Yuan dynasty included in the exhibition, Chinese and Japanese Bronzes, Michael Goedhuis, 1988, Catalogue, nos. 80 and 81. See, also, the inlaid animal-form censer dated Ming, illustrated in Ancient Chinese Arts in the Idemitsu Collection, Japan, 1989, fig. 463. Another, dated Song, was included in the Catalogue of a Collection of Objects of Chinese Art, Burlington Fine Arts Club, London, 1915, pl. XXXV, no. 14.

For the original inlaid Warring States prototype of this form, refer to the Catalogue of the Special Exhibition of Shang and Chou Dynasty Bronze Wine Vessels, National Palace Museum, Taipei, 1989, pl. 66.

The result of Oxford Authentication Ltd. thermoluminescence test no. C298f6 is consistent with the dating of this lot.