MING-EARLY QING DYNASTY, 14TH-17TH CENTURY

The shape and decoration of this unusual vessel are based on late Shang dynasty bronze zun of double-ram shape, two of which are in public museums, and both of which are illustrated by Robert W. Bagley in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, The Arthur M. Sackler Foudation, 1987; one in the Nezu Museum, Japan, p. 122, fig. 175, the other in the British Museum, p. 121, fig. 173. The present vessel has been quite faithful to these early prototypes, despite interpreting the decoration with gold and silver inlay. See, also, the gold and silver-inlaid bronze double-ram zun in the National Palace Museum illustrated in Through the Prism of the Past, Taipei, 2003, p. 146, no. III-10, where it is dated Ming to early Qing.