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View full screen - View 1 of Lot 70. An incised gilt-bronze tripod vessel and cover (Lian), Han dynasty.

An incised gilt-bronze tripod vessel and cover (Lian), Han dynasty

Auction Closed

September 18, 08:03 PM GMT

Estimate

50,000 - 70,000 USD

Lot Details

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Description

(2)


Height 9¼ in., 23.5 cm

Robert Rousset (19💫01-1981), Paris, acq🐻uired prior to 1935.

Jean-Pierre Rousset (1936-2021), Paris.

Adorned with finely incised animals and huntsmen running among crashing waves and mountains, this vessel is a marvel of late archaic bronzework. Known as lian, vessels of this shape emerged during the Warring States period and were frequently found among elite tombs. Though the original use of lian remains unclear – whether used as cosmetic boxes or as wenjiuzun ('warmers for clear liquor'♚) – their symbolic function♑ as a sign of status is evident. 


Given the fine decoration and gilding of this piece, it was likely the possession of a particularly wealthy individual. Compare a similarly gilded lian excavated from a Han tomb at Furong Garden, Yanta District, Xi'an, Shaanxi, 2003, now preserved in the Xi'an Museum and exhibited at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Age of Empires: Chinese Art of the Qin and Han Dynasties (221 B.C.–A.D. 200), New York, 2017, cat. no. 68, also published on the Museum's website; another from the collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing, completely plain but for a similar floral finial, handles and three horizontal bands, illustrated in Zhongguo Qingtongqi Quanji [Complete Collection of Chinese bronzes], vol. 12, Beijing, 1998, pl. 44; and another, with a similar animal scene rendered in high relief, preserved in the Shanxi Provincial Museum, illustrated ibid., pls 37 and 38. 


Reminiscent of the mythical tales captured in the Han anthology, the Shanhaijing ('Classic of Mountains and Seas'), lian vessels frequently feature fantastical landscapes of whirling animals, two ring handles in the mouths of mythical beasts and sturdy bear-shaped legs. Compare an ungilded lian sharing all of these features from the Freer Collection of the National Museum of Asian Art, illustrated in Haiwai yizhen: Tongqi / Hai-wai Yi-chen: Chinese Art in Overseas Collections. Bronze, vol. I, Taipei, 1985, pl. 181, alongside a similar detached handle from the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, pl. 187; another of related animal design rendered in openwork from the collection of the Clevela🎀nd Museum of Art (accession no. 197🐬2.44); and another, mostly unadorned but for related handles and horizontal bands and a peacock painted to the underside, sold at Christie's New York, 18th March 2009, lot 219.