Vase jue 爵

Entre -1550 et -1300
Bronze, Fonte, Fonte au moule
Objet religieux, Vase
Don manuel : Mahé, Yves; Mahé, Lotus

M.C. 10014

This jue illustrates more explicitly this pivotal period in the evolution of bronze work in China. The prominent spout, slim feet and wide horizontal bands around the middle section depicting a taotie monster mask are all characteristic of the style. The opposite side has a wide semi-circular-section handle. With its slender shape and long, narrow, rather unstable feet, the work is reminiscent of a jue in the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto.
Most of the jue vessels for libations have two small fungiform appendices on the lip, which some have suggested were used to hang small bags of condiments to flavour the fermented beverages. Here, a single knob sits atop a sort of metal bridge. This rarity specific to the Erligang era is found on several other jue from the same period, including the following four: one discovered near Zhengzhou (Henan), in the Baijiazhuang M3 grave; another in Feixi, Anhui; a third in the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto, thought to have been found in Henan, at Hui Xian Dongshihecun; a fourth in the Museo Nazionale d’Arte Orientale, Rome.

Reference(s) : Robert W. Bagley, Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collection, Washington D.C., The Arthur M. Sackler Foundation/Cambridge Mass., The Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard University, 1987, vol.1, p.76, fig.46.
Henan Chutu Shang Zhou qingtongqi (Les bronzes Shang et Zhou exhumés au Henan), Beijing, Wenwu chubanshe, 1981, vol.1, n°30.
Wenhua da Geming qijian chutu wenwu (Objets culturels exhumés pendant la Révolution Culturelle), vol.1, Beijing , Wenwu chubanshe, 1972, n°40.
Christian Deydier , L'Art et la Matière, Paris/Londres, Oriental Bronzes, 1998, p.8 et 9, n°1.
Gilles Béguin, Activités du musée Cernuschi, Arts asiatiques, 1999, t.54, p.129-130.
Art chinois, Musée Cernuschi, acquisitions 1993-2004, ParisMusées/Editions Findakly, 2005, p. 20-21.