A Rare Archaic Bronze 'Double Owl' Ritual Food Vessel (you). Late Shang Dynasty, 13th-11th Century BC. Photo Sotheby's

of oval section in the form of two addorsed owls, their rounded bodies supported on four stout legs, cast in low relief with four wings of simple curvilinear outline separated by a pair of ring handles, the domed fitted cover cast on each side with a pair of large round domed eyes centered on a sharp hooked beak, the heads further adorned with two pairs of C-shaped ears, all below a pyramidal-shaped finial cast with leiwen, the patina a mottled brown-green, the cover with malachite and cuprite encrustation, Japanese wood box (3). Height 7 1/2 in., 16.5 cm - ESTIMATION 150,000-200,000 USD

PROVENANCE: Old Japanese Collection.

NOTE DE CATALOGUE: You vessels of this type belong to two major groups - ones with surface decoration and those plainly decorated. The present lot belongs to the latter. Compare a very similar one in the Shanxi Provincial Museum, illustrated in Zhongguo Qingtongqi Quanji, vol. 4, Beijing, 1998, pls. 154, 155. Other related you include two cast with similar loops on the side and a bail handle and with more taotie-like features on the cover, in the Hubei Yingxing Wenhua Guancang and the Shanghai Museum, both illustrated ibid, pls. 156, 157. A closely related 'double owl' vessel was sold in these rooms 20th March 2012, lot 13.

Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, New York | 11 sept. 2012 www.sothebys.com