Lot 18. A very rare archaic bronze ritual wine vessel, Gu, Shang Dynasty (c. 1500-1050 BC); 31cm (12 1/4in) high. Estimate: £150,000 - 200,000 (€ 170,000 - 230,000). Unsold. © Bonhams.

The slender vessel cast on the flaring trumpet neck with four blades of stylised cicada with double eyes forming dispersed taotie masks in raised relief on a fine leiwen ground, extending from a horizontal band of kui dragons, the central section cast with further taotie masks bisected by raised notched flanges, separated from the lower section by paired relief 'bowstring' lines, the flanges repeated on the flaring foot enhancing elaborate horizontal kui dragons with c-shaped horns, the surface displaying a brilliant emerald green patina with vivid malachite encrustations, the interior foot with two pictographs reading 'Yue fu geng'.

Provenance: Wui Po Kok Antique, Hong Kong, 1990
Gisele Croes Arts D'Extreme Orient, Brussels, 2013
Jean-Yves Ollivier Collection.

Published and Illustrated: G.Croës, Matter and Memory. Asia Week New York, Brussels, 2014, pp.30-31

Note: Bronze gu vessels such as the present lot were among the most important objects used in state rituals of the late Shang dynasty. Similar archaic bronze gu vases from the late Shang dynasty can be found in a number of important museum collections. 

Compare with two similar gu illustrated in Bronzes in the Palace Museum, Beijing, 1999, pp.68-69, nos.40 and 43; see another similar gu dated to the middle/late Anyang period, of similar size (31.7cm high) and archaistic decorative motifs, illustrated in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the National Palace Museum Collection, Taipei, 1998, pp.280-283, no.41l; and another example in the Henan Provincial Museum, illustrated in Zhongguo Meishu Fenlei Quanji: Zhongguo Qingtongqi Quanji: Shang, vol.IV, Beijing, 2006, p.67, no.69.

The blade motif at the neck of these slender vessels is an Anyang innovation. See R.Bagley, Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M.Sackler Collections, p.229. A similar gu, late Shang dynasty, excavated in Anyang, now in the Institute of Archaeology, The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, is illustrated by Li Jianwei and Niu Ruihong, Zhongguo Qingtong ji tulu, vol.I, Beijing, 2005, p.118 (top); see also a related excavated example, unearthed at Yongdoucun, Majiahe, Yanchuan county, Shaanxi Province, in the Cultural Relics Institute of Yan'an, Shaanxi Province, illustrated in Bronzes from Northern Shaanxi, vol.II Chengdu, 2009, p.155; and another excavated from the Shang tomb at Xiaqiyuan, Ci county, in the collection of the Hebei Museum, illustrated in National Treasures of Hebei Province, Hebei, 2008, p.100. 

A similar ritual bronze wine vessel, gu, late Shang dynasty, was sold at Bonhams Hong Kong, 29 November 2016, lot 28. See also another related gu, late Shang dynasty, which was sold at Sotheby's New York, 18 March 2014, lot 6.

Bonhams. The Ollivier Collection of Early Chinese Art, London, 8 Nov 2018