A SMALL FINELY ENGRAVED SILVER STEM CUP
A SMALL FINELY ENGRAVED SILVER STEM CUP
A SMALL FINELY ENGRAVED SILVER STEM CUP
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Property from a Princely Collection
A SMALL FINELY ENGRAVED SILVER STEM CUP

TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)

Details
A SMALL FINELY ENGRAVED SILVER STEM CUP
TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)
2 in. (5.1 cm.) high; weight 36.4 g
Provenance
Dr. Johan Carl Kempe (1884-1967) Collection, Sweden, before 1953, no. CK102.
Masterpieces of Chinese Precious Metalwork. Early Gold and Silver; Sotheby's London, 14 May 2008, lot 47.
Literature
B. Gyllensvärd, Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, Stockholm, 1953, cat. p. 32, no. 102.
B. Gyllensvärd, ‘T’ang Gold and Silver’, Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm, No. 29, 1957, figs. 55a, 75c, 86b, 87f.
Han Wei, Hai nei wai Tangdai jin yin qi cui bian, (Tang Gold and Silver in Chinese and overseas collections), Xi’an, 1989, pl. 44.
Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, The Museum of Art and Far Eastern Antiquities in Ulricehamn, Ulricehamn, 1999, p. 145, pl. 104.
Exhibited
Washington, D. C., Smithsonian Institution, Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, 1954-55.

Brought to you by

Rufus Chen (陳嘉安)
Rufus Chen (陳嘉安) Head of Sale, AVP, Specialist

Lot Essay


Cups of this goblet shape were popular during the Tang dynasty, and are found with varying decorations, often a scrolling foliate pattern, and more rarely a scrolling grapevine such as that seen on the present cup. A stem cup with this decoration is illustrated in Sui to no bijutsu, Osaka Municipal Art Museum, 1976, p. 32, no. 2-23. It can also be seen on two bottle-shaped silver vases of Tang date, illustrated by Clarence W. Kelley, Chinese Gold & Silver in American Collections, The Dayton Art Institute, Dayton, Ohio, 1984, no. 49, dated early 8th century, and no. 50, dated late 8th-9th century. On both of these, birds and animals are interspersed amidst the grape vine. A cup of this form decorated with scrolling grape vines was unearthed from the reliquary chamber of the pagoda at the Qingshan Temple in Lindongxian, Shaanxi province. The construction of the temple was begun in AD 736, and in AD 740 the reliquary was placed in the subterranean chamber of the pagoda along with other objects of gold, silver, bronze and ceramic.

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