Vase you 卣
Bronze, Fonte, Fonte au moule
Vaisselle et ustensile de cuisine, Vase, Objet religieux
Achat en vente publique
M.C. 6142
This you, whose handle and lid are missing, features a fine design of crested birds facing each other but with their heads turned around. On the neck, a narrower band features, on either side of a taotie mask in relief, two other birds with arched bodies. The base of each handle takes the form of a very recognizable ram’s head with curved horns.
The theme of birds facing each other within a large spiralling motif is not rare in the 10th century BC. It can be more or less stylised and, as in the Museum Cernuschi piece and in a zun in the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery (Rawson, 1990, vol. II B, p. 592, no. 91), designed with great attention to detail.
The Paris bronze has close similarities with two other you, a small-sized specimen in the imperial collections (Gugong, 1958, vol. 2, no. 139) and another in the Sumitomo Collection (Umehara, 1971, no. 80). On these two pieces, other crested birds within two large spirals adorn the lid.
Vadime Elisseeff, Bronzes archaïques chinois au musée Cernuschi, vol.1, t.1, n°23, Paris, L'Asiathèque, 1977.
Gugong tongqi tulu, (Catalogue des bronzes du musée National du Palais), 2 vol., Taipei, 1958.
Jessica Rawson, Western Zhou Ritual Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, 2 vol., Washington : The Arthur M. Sackler Fondation / Cambridge: The Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard University, (Ancient Chinese Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, vol. II A et II B), 1995.
Jörg Trübner, Yu und Kuang Zur Typologie der Chinesischen Bronzen, Leipzig: Klinkhardt / Biermann Verlag, 1999.
Umehara, Sueji, Shinshu sen'oku Seishō, 2 vol., Kyōto, Sen'oku Hakkotan.
