Lot 101. A rare archaic bronze wine vessel (fanglei), Late Shang Dynasty, 13th - 11th century BC. Height 15 1/2 in., 39.4 cm. Estimate 30,000 — 50,000 USD. Lot sold 68,500 USD. Photo Sotheby's

of rectangular section with high rounded shoulders, cast with eight large pendent triangular blades each enclosing a taotie mask above a small cicada and one with a central raised animal mask, each side with a broad band of further taotie divided by flanges against a leiwen ground below a band of domed whorls alternating with kui dragons, the shoulder cast with striding kui dragons on a leiwen ground centered on a high relief bovine masks on the long sides  and loop handles issuing from similar masks on the short sides, the straight neck with further pairs of confronting dragons divided by flanges, with a pictorgram of a chariot and charioteers (likely a clan name) on the interior of the neck, Japanese wood box (2).

Property from The Masaki Museum of Art.

Provenance: Japanese Collection, acquired before the 1960s.

Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, New York, 11 september 2012