LATE SHANG DYNASTY, ANYANG, 12TH-11TH CENTURY BC

Related liding of this type, featuring large, relief-cast taotie masks on each lobe of the body, include two very similar examples from the Sackler Collection illustrated by R. Bagley in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Washington, D. C., 1987, pp. 486-91, nos. 93 and 94. In his entry for one of the Sackler liding, no. 93, Bagley illustrates seven related liding to support his assertion that there was a "wide geographic distribution of the type in late Anyang times", with a continuation into the early Western Zhou period. Other similar liding are in the Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo, illustrated in The 15th Anniversary Catalogue, 1981, p. 235, no. 1009, and the Nathanael Wessén Collection, illustrated by Karlgren and Wirgin in Chinese Bronzes, Stockholm, Ostasiatiska Museet, 1969, pl. 2. Another similar vessel was unearthed from a Western Zhou site at Zaoyuancun in Changwuxian, Shaanxi, and is illustrated in Shaanxi Chutu Shang Zhou Qingtongqi (Bronze Vessels Unearthed from the Shaanxi Province), vol. 4, pl. 160. Further similar liding include the two sold at Christie’s New York, Power and Prestige: Important Early Chinese Ritual Bronzes from a Distinguished European Collection, 22 March 2019, lots 1502 and 1507, and the example sold at Christie’s Paris, 9 June 2021, lot 15.