MIDDLE SPRING AND AUTUMN PERIOD, EARLY 6TH CENTURY BC

Details

A SMALL BRONZE ELLIPTICAL CUP
MIDDLE SPRING AND AUTUMN PERIOD, EARLY 6TH CENTURY BC
The vessel has a deep body rising from a flat foot to a waisted neck and everted rim, and has an indentation bisecting the two long sides, one of which is set with the single loop handle. The sides are flat-cast with a band of blades filled with confronted dragons pendent from a band of conjoined scrolling dragons interrupted at one end by a tiny ring. There is a mottled milky green patina and blue-green encrustation on the interior.
5 1/8 in. (13 cm.) long

Provenance

Ching Wah Lee Collection; Sotheby's Los Angeles, 8 June 1981, lot 200. Butterfield & Butterfield, San Francisco, 11 November 1998, lot 1406.

Brought to you by

Michael Bass

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Lot Essay

A similar cup is illustrated by J. So, Eastern Zhou Ritual Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Arthur M. Sackler Foundation, Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 1985, pp. 295-6, no. 54, where another, fig. 54.1, is also illustrated. In these latter examples there is only a single dragon in the blades, but the upper band is very similar to that on the present example.

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