Lot 279. Three bronze circular mirrors, Warring States to Eastern Han Dynasty. Estimate £1,200 - 1,500 (€1,500 - 1,900). Photo Bonhams.

Comprising: a silvery bronze mirror with central ribbed loop handle, crisply cast with a frieze of three stylised phoenix bearing elaborately entwined bodies and angular meander, on a whorl pattern ground; a silvered bronze mirror cast with two stylised guei dragons, the sinuous bodies terminating with phoenix heads, within a border of twelve linked arcs; and a small bronze mirror, the central knop surrounded by four nipples enclosing pairs of facing birds.
13.5cm (5.3/8in); 10.8cm (4.1/4in) and 8.8cm (3.1/2in) diam. (3).

The Professor R. Beaver Collection of Early Chinese Bronzes and Japanese Sword Fittings

Notes: Mirrors of the phoenix type are illustrated in Zhongguo Qingtongqi Quanji - 16 - Bronze Mirrors, Beijing, 1998, p. 10, no. 10, excavated in 1952 at Changsha, Hunan province; Ancient Bronze Mirrors from the Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, 2005, 1998, pp. 100-1, no. 15 (16.5 cm.); one from the Sumitomo Collection in the exhibition catalogue,Chinese Bronze Mirrors, Sen-Oku Hakuko Kan, Kyoto, 8 January - 6 March 2011, p. 15, no. 13 (20.3 cm.); and one illustrated by Ju-hsi Chou, Circles of Reflection: The Carter Collection of Chinese Bronze Mirrors, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2000, p.28, no.6. 

For a related example of the twin dragons mirror see Circles of Reflection: The Carter Collection of Chinese Bronze Mirrors, The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2000, p.39, no. 19

Bonhams. AUCTION 23541: ASIAN ART, 10:30 BST - LONDON, KNIGHTSBRIDGE