Lot 106. A fine and rare gold dish, Song dynasty (960-1279), 13.6cm., 5 3/8 in. Estimate 30,000 — 40,000 GBP. Lot sold 412,500 GBP. Photo: Sotheby's.

of circular shape and with shallow, gently rounded sides, the centre finely chased and engraved with a roundel formed by two large peonies blooms set amidst large feathery leaves and curling tendrils, the everted rim finely incised with a coin pattern, weight 104g.

Exhibited: Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., 1954-55, cat. no. 52.

Literature: Bo Gyllensvärd, Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, Stockholm, 1953, pl. 52.

R. Soame Jenyns & William Watson, Chinese Art, The Minor Arts, London, 1963, pl. 15.

Chinese Gold and Silver in the Carl Kempe Collection, The Museum of Art and Far Eastern Antiquities in Ulricehamn, Ulricehamn, 1999, pl. 49.

Note: The present dish is a rare example of vessels made in pure gold during the Song dynasty. Although gold and silver utensils and vessels were made in large quantities during the Tang dynasty, very few Song pieces have been preserved to the present. A rare Song gold dish of this form, decorated in the centre with a large blooming lotus motif, formerly in the collections of Christian Holmes and the Hon. Hugh Scott, and now in the collection of Pierre Uldry, is illustrated in Chinesisches Gold und Silber, Zurich, 1994, pl. 272.