TANG DYNASTY (AD 618-907)

The present mirror is lavishly inlaid with gold and silver sheet with birds, butterflies, clouds and flowers. Mirrors of this type, with their rich combination of gold and silver decoration on a lacquer ground set into the back of the bronze mirror, reflect the splendor and sumptuous taste of the Tang court. Mirrors similar to the present example found their way to Japan at an early date, such as the similarly decorated eight-lobed mirror in the Shoso-in, illustrated by Ryochi Hayashi, The Silk Road and the Shoso-in, New York/Tokyo, 1975, p. 129, fig. 142. See, also, an eight-lobed example with flowers and birds in the Cleveland Museum of Art illustrated by J. C. Y. Watt and P. Harper in China: Dawn of a Golden Age, 200-750 AD, New York, 2004, p. 322, no. 217. Neither of these examples, however, is as densely decorated as the present example.