A WELL-CAST ARCHAIC BRONZE BELL, ZHONG

Details

A WELL-CAST ARCHAIC BRONZE BELL, ZHONG
SPRING AND AUTUMN PERIOD, 770-476 B.C.

Of lenticular section, each side with a plain central field flanked by alternating rows of coiled dragon bosses and dragon scroll cast in low relief, all within narrow, raised borders and set above a panel of similar dense dragon scroll repeated on the top below the large scroll handle formed by two crouching dragons, each with head turned backwards and fangs protruding from the open jaws, with a series of carefully placed slits in the top and body, with a mottled green and brownish surface
20½in. (52cm.) high, stand

Lot Essay

Compare the slightly smaller bell with addorsed tigers on the suspension loop, included by Yutaka Mino and James Robinson in the exhibition Beauty and Tranquility: The Eli Lilly Collection of Chinese Art, Indianapolis Museum of Art, 1983, Catalogue, pl. 33. Refer, also, to the bell with a similar arrangement of motifs, but a different suspension loop and a larger design band at the base, illustrated by Henry Trubner, Asiatic Art in the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, 1973, pp. 133, no. 74