Raised on three thick, blade-shaped legs, the vessel is flat-cast on the body and the base of the neck with bands of taotie masks formed by birds with quills, rounded eyes, hooked beaks and scroll-filled bodies centered on narrow flanges, the decoration enhanced by a black matrix in the recessed areas. A plain strap handle is set to one side and the posts that rise from the rim have conical caps cast with comma motifs.

Provenance: Acquired in Hong Kong, 1991.

Note: Jia of this type, with the decoration arranged in two registers, appeared shortly before the Anyang period (c. 1300-1030 BC). The main decoration was usually that of taotie masks, either cast in relief or flat-cast as on the present jia, and on the very similar jia of comparable height (35.2 cm.), illustrated in Shang Ritual Bronzes in the National Palace Museum Collection, Taipei, 1998, pp. 152-7, no. 9, which is dated early Anyang period (13th century BC). As with the present jia, the taotie masks on the National Palace example are formed by birds with quills, hooked beaks and rounded eyes confronted on a narrow flange. Also illustrated, p. 156, are two jia excavated in 1968 at Xiao chuan, Anyang prefecture, Henan province, the first from Tomb M388, the other from Tomb 331. Both of these have flat-cast decoration, similar posts and simple strap handles. Another similar jia, also flat-cast with birds with quills forming the taotie masks, in the Röhss Museum, is illustrated by Bernhard Karlgren in "Some Characteristics of the Yin Art," BMFEA, No. 34, 1962, pl. 31a. See, also, another jia of this type, also with flat-cast taotie bands, and similar strap handle and posts, sold at Christie's New York, 19 March 2008, lot 487.

Christie's. Important Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, New York, 25 September 2020