A BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD WINE VESSEL, JIA

LATE SHANG DYNASTY, 12TH-11TH CENTURY BC

Details

A BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD WINE VESSEL, JIA
LATE SHANG DYNASTY, 12TH-11TH CENTURY BC
The vessel is raised on three hollowed mammiform legs, each centered by a vertical mold mark that rises to a bow-string band that encircles the shoulder, while another encircles the bottom of the broad trumpet-form neck which rises to an upright rim set with two rectangular posts surmounted by whorl-decorated conical caps. A bovine mask surmounts the loop handle.
11 5/8 in. (29.5 cm.) high

Provenance

J.T. Tai & Co., New York, May 1963.
Arthur M. Sackler Collections, New York.
Else Sackler Collection, and thence by descent within the family.

Literature

R.W. Bagley, Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Arthur M. Sackler Foundation, 1987, pp. 172-73, no. 10.

Exhibited

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Aspects of Ch'ang-sha Culture, 21 August - 24 September, 1967.

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Lot Essay

A jia of similar date and shape, in the Shanghai Museum, which is said to be from Anyang, is illustrated by R.W. Bagley in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Arthur M. Sackler Foundation, 1987, p. 175, fig. 10.2. Although the Shanghai jia also has bowstring bands around the shoulder and neck, which the author notes as an unusual placement, it has the addition of a continuous decorative band around the body, which is formed by joined V-shaped bands on each leg that are outlined in bowstring borders.

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