Lot 23. A Bronze 'Shan' Mirror, Warring States Period  (475-221 BC). Diameter 6 1/4  in., 15.9 cm. Lot sold 15,000 USD (Estimate 6,000 — 8,000 USD). Photo Sotheby's

crisply cast with four shan elements springing from the beveled rim with flat outer edge towards the central concave square band containing a small central triple-fluted knob, all on a finely granulated and feather-patterned ground, slightly encrusted patina, patches of malachite. 

Property of the Collection of Mr. Benjamin D'Ancona, New York

Exhibited: The Chinese Art Society of America, China House, New York, February 1951.

Literature: An Exhibition of Chinese Mirrors, The China Art Society of America, China House, New York, 1951, no. 5.

Note: Similar examples are in the Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop , 1943.52.147; others are illustrated in Toru Nakano, Bronze Mirrors from Ancient China, Donald H. Graham Jr. Collection, Hong Kong 1994, pp. 64-65; Ancient Bronze Mirrors in the Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, 2005, pp. 78-9, no. 4; Ancient Bronze Mirrors in the National Museum of History, Taipei, 1996, p. 85; and by Bernhard Karlgreen, Early Chinese Mirrors, B.M.F.E.A. Stockholm, 1968, no. 40, pl. 20, C. 51.