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Lot Essay
Acquired in July 1994.
Hu of this basic form, with and without cover, are well-known, but no piece of this more rounded shape and with this particular decoration seems to be published.
The design is a tour-de-force of interweaving motifs. As if sinuous snakes were not enough to play with in themselves, a lattice has been added for the snakes to pass over and under. For comparable, though less complicated designs of interweaving dragons, see two lei from the Warring States period included in the Special Exhibition of Shang and Chou Dynasty Bronze Wine Vessels in the Palace Museum Taiwan, 1989, pls. 63 and 64.
For various other examples, compare Jenny So, Eastern Zhou Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, vol. III, New York, 1995, pls. 38, 42, and 50; and another two in Bernhard Karlgren & Jan Wirgin, Chinese Bronzes: The Natanael Wessén Collection, The Museum of Far Eastern Anqituities, Stockholm, 1969, col. pl. 6 and pl. 39.
Hu of this basic form, with and without cover, are well-known, but no piece of this more rounded shape and with this particular decoration seems to be published.
The design is a tour-de-force of interweaving motifs. As if sinuous snakes were not enough to play with in themselves, a lattice has been added for the snakes to pass over and under. For comparable, though less complicated designs of interweaving dragons, see two lei from the Warring States period included in the Special Exhibition of Shang and Chou Dynasty Bronze Wine Vessels in the Palace Museum Taiwan, 1989, pls. 63 and 64.
For various other examples, compare Jenny So, Eastern Zhou Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, vol. III, New York, 1995, pls. 38, 42, and 50; and another two in Bernhard Karlgren & Jan Wirgin, Chinese Bronzes: The Natanael Wessén Collection, The Museum of Far Eastern Anqituities, Stockholm, 1969, col. pl. 6 and pl. 39.