A RARE ARCHAIC BRONZE VESSEL, ZUN

SHANG DYNASTY, ANYANG PERIOD, 13TH/12TH CENTURY B.C.

Details

A RARE ARCHAIC BRONZE VESSEL, ZUN
Shang Dynasty, Anyang Period, 13th/12th Century B.C.
Of broad shape, the body and spreading oval foot each cast with six vertical notched flanges alternately centering taotie masks with raised eyes reserved on a tightly spiraled leiwen ground, the masks on the body below pairs of confronted long-tailed birds, the short shoulder cast in high relief with three equally spaced horned bovine masks divided by short notched flanges and the widely flaring neck cast in low relief with a band of three pairs of stylized confronted birds below upright cicada-shaped lappets, a barely discernable pictograph in the center of the interior, with areas of malachite encrustation
13.1/8in. (33.5cm.) high

Provenance

Mrs. Felix Guggenheim Collection, Beverly Hills

Literature

George Kuwayama, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, Los Angeles County Museum, Catalogue, 1976, no. 10

Exhibited

Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, 1976, no. 10

Lot Essay

A very similar zun is illustrated by Bernhard Karlgren, "Some Characteristics of the Yin Art", B.M.F.E.A., No. 32, Stockholm, 1960, pl. 22(b) and another with the same decoration cast in relief rather than flat cast is also illustrated by Karlgren, op. cit., pl. 20(b)

Other similar zun with some variations in the subsidiary bands are in the British Museum illustrated by William Watson, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, London, 1962, pl. 9a; in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, included in the exhibition, Ritual Vessels of Bronze Age China, the Asia Society, New York, 1968, Catalogue, pp. 74 and 75, no. 29; in the Avery Brundage Collection illustrated by Ren-Yvon Lefebvre d'Argenc, Bronze Vessels of Ancient China, Japan, 1977, pp. 40 and 41, pl. XII (top left); and one included in the Hong Kong O.C.S. exhibition, Ancient Chinese and Ordos Bronzes, Hong Kong Museum of Art, October 12 - December 2, 1990, Catalogue, no. 12

An analysis by Conservation and Technical Services Ltd., University of London, is consistent with the dating of this lot