Lot 1526
1526
A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING
A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING
A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING
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A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING
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PROPERTY FROM A PRIVATE AMERICAN COLLECTION
A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING

SPRING AND AUTUMN PERIOD, EARLY TO MID-6TH CENTURY BC

Details
A RARE LARGE AND FINELY CAST BRONZE RITUAL TRIPOD FOOD VESSEL AND COVER, DING
SPRING AND AUTUMN PERIOD, EARLY TO MID-6TH CENTURY BC
The vessel has a deep, rounded body raised on three tall legs that splay at the bottom, and is flat cast around the sides with two registers of abstract interlaced dragons, all above a frieze of pendent lappets each containing a taotie mask set amidst hooked scrolls and curls. Further similar bands of abstract dragons decorate the inward and outward faces of the upright handles as well as two bands of the shallow domed cover. Below these two bands is a narrow plain band trisected by three fixed ring finials and an outer band of angular scroll with curled ends reserved on a leiwen ground. The center of the cover is cast with a medallion enclosing a feline with granulated body set within a narrow band of dragons. The bronze has an attractive mottled grey and blue-green patina.
20 ¾ in. (52.7 cm.) wide across handles
Provenance
Gisèle Croës, Brussels, May 2000.
Literature
Gisèle Croës, Light for the After-Life. Selected Objects, Brussels, 2000, pp. 22-23.
Exhibited
New York, Gisèle Croës, Light for the After-Life. Selected Objects, 24-29 March 2000.

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Olivia Hamilton
Olivia Hamilton
212-636-2180

Lot Essay


A bronze ding and cover of similar proportions but of smaller size (24. 3 cm. high), with related bands of flat-cast decoration and with a similar feline with granulated body occupying the central medallion on the cover, is illustrated by Jenny So in Eastern Zhou Ritual Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections,  The Arthur M. Sackler Foundation, 1995, pp. 126-8, no. 12, where it is dated Eastern Zhou, middle Spring and Autumn period, early to mid-6th century BC. Also illustrated, p. 129, fig. 12.1, is one of three large ding very similar to the current vessel, but of smaller size (40 cm. high), from Shanxi Houma Shangmacun, which also features a similar feline medallion in the center of the cover. So also illustrates, p. 135, fig. 13.4, a fragment of a 6th-century BC ceramic casting mold from Shanxi Houma Niucun, which features abstract interlaced dragon decoration very similar to that seen on the current vessel, “in which the dragon heads have become squared, undetailed forms rendered flush with the vessel surface.”

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