The inscription may be translated as: 'After the sowing of the crops chariots followed the Emperor south, attacked and defeated the Ch'u king and seized their property: thus was this vessel made to be used in honour of Father Wu with trasures and wine as a sacrificial vessel'. Compare another gui illustrated by Karlgren, op. cit., pl.16, no.B22, apparently related to the same event

Compare also a gui illustrated in Ancient Chinese Arts in the Idemitsu Collection, pl.24, The Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, 1969, p.44-47, B.M.F.E.A., no.9, 1937, Fig.349, pl.XXXVII, by Watson, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, 1962, Fig.39b, Zhonguo Guqing Jingqi Xuan, 1976, pl.11, from the Shanghai Museum; by Umehara, The Collection of Old Bronzes of Sumitomo, pl.X; Eskenazi, Ancient Chinese Bronzes from the Stoclet and Wessen Collections, p.26, no.3, Rawson, Western Zhou Ritual Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, vol.IIB, p.393, no. 45, with very similar decoration and animal heads surmounting the loop handles. Cf. also a related gui in Wenwu, 1976, no.4, pl.6, Fig.1, as well as to a similar diamond-and-boss design on a cup-like vessel, pl.6, Fig.2, excavated from a tomb at Rujia Zhuang, Shaanxi, Wenwu, 1978, no.5, p.95, Fig.2, with slightly different tabs

The heavy heads on the handles, of a blockish and primitive type, represent the survival of earlier conventions. These origins demonstrated on the handles of probably the earliest surviving gui, excavated at Panlongcheng, Hubei are illustrated by Rawson, op.cit., p.393, no.45.5

Similar vessels were sold in London, 3 December 1963, lot 184, 20 February 1968, lot 53; and 11 December 1990