A PAIR OF GILT-BRONZE RECTANGULAR BELT PLAQUES

NORTH CHINA, 2ND CENTURY BC

Details

A PAIR OF GILT-BRONZE RECTANGULAR BELT PLAQUES
NORTH CHINA, 2ND CENTURY BC
Each is cast in openwork with two confronted Bactrian camels nibbling on leafy branches that extend from their mouths to their rear haunches. Between them at the bottom is the head of a feline, and the whole scene is within a braided rope border. Two squared loops are attached to the slightly concave reverse.
3 ½ in. (9 cm.) wide

Provenance

J. J. Lally & Co., New York, 17 February 1990.
The Erwin Harris Collection, Miami, Florida.

Lot Essay

Compare the similar pair of gilt-bronze plaques illustrated by E. C. Bunker et al., Nomadic Art of the Eastern Eurasian Steppes, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2002, p. 109, no. 79, where the camels are described as flanking an Asian elm tree. As with the present plaques, there are two vertically arranged loops on the reverse of each which bears impressions of a coarse fabric used in the lost wax/lost textile method of manufacture.

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