Lot 22. A bronze ritual tripod vessel (ding), Middle Western Zhou dynasty, 10th-9th century BC. Height 8 in., 20.3 cm. Estimate 80,000 - 120,000 USD. Lot sold 605,000 USD. Photo: Sothebys.

raised on three tubular legs with taotie and ring-lined terminals, the rounded body cast with taotie masks centered on raised flanges, the flat everted rim set with two upright loop handles, the sides crisply cast with a band of stylized dragon motifs interspersed by further raised flanges, above a wide band of diamond diaper enclosing bosses, all on a finely defined leiwen ground, the interior cast with a four-character inscription, the first a pictogram then followed by Zuo Fu Ji (Made for Father Ji), the patina of a deep malachite-green. 

Provenance: Sotheby's London, 10th November 2004, lot 504. 

Notes: The ding bears a four-character inscription starting with a clan sign. Compare a dingwith similar decoration of a lozenge diaper enclosing bosses on the body, but with plain legs and leiwen design around the rim, illustrated in Shaanxi chutu Shang Zhou qingtongqi, vol. 1, Beijing, 1979, p. 42, pl. 27; and another from the collection of Professor Bullock included in the exhibition Ancient Chinese Bronzes from an English Private Collection, Eskenazi, London, 1999, cat. no. 4. Another related ding excavated in 1985 from a tomb site near Anyang, Henan province, is included in Zhongguo qingtongqi quanji, vol. 2, Beijing, 1997, pl. 23; and one is illustrated in Bernhard Karlgren, 'New Studies on Chinese Bronzes', The Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, No. 9, Stockholm, 1937, pl. XXXII.