Lot 1055. An inscribed archaic bronze ritual lamp, jiaodou, Six Dynasties period (317-587); h. 25.2 cm. Estimate: 10,000 - 15,000 HKD. Lot sold: 163,800 HKD. Photo: Sotheby's.

with a three-character inscription on the handle, probably reading cheng ji er.

Note: A closely related jiaotou in the Art Museum, Princeton University is published in Eleanor von Erdberg, Chinese Bronzes from the Collection of Chester Dale and Dolly Carter, Ascona, 1978, p. 58, pl. 37, where a jiaotou, similar to the Carter vessel, found in a Han tomb at Wuhu in Anhui is mentioned. See also a jiaotou can be found in the Avery Brundage Collection in the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco illustrated in René-Yvon Lefebvre d'Argencé, Ancient Chinese Bronzes in the Avery Brundage Collection, Berkeley, 1966, pl. LVA. d'Argencé, ibid., p. 120, notes that oil-lamps of this form translated time-honoured concepts into a new idiom during the Han dynasty, when monsters and wild beasts were replaced by a gentle and familiar fauna, and complex linear effects gave way to plain three-dimensional ones.  Another similar jiaotou in the British Museum, London, is included in William Watson, Handbook to the Collections of Early Chinese Antiquities, London, 1963, fig. 23b; and one from the collection of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York, no. 1942:16.391, was sold in our New York rooms, 19th-20th March 2007, lot 516.

From the Collection of Arthur B. Michael, Newton Center, MA (bequest of 1942) & the Collection of Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York, no. 1942:16.391An archaic bronze ritual lamp, (Jiaotou), Eastern Han Dynasty / Early Six Dynasties Period, 2nd - 4th century AD; Width 11 in., 28 cm. Estimate 2,000 — 3,000 USD. Lot sold 4,200 USD at Sotheby's New York rooms, 19th-20th March 2007, lot 516. Photo Sotheby's.