An Archaic bronze food vessel, li ding, Late Shang Dynasty (1600-1100 BC)
Lot 151. An Archaic bronze food vessel, li ding, Late Shang Dynasty (1600-1100 BC). 8 in., 20.3 cm. Estimate 30,000 — 40,000 USD. Lot sold 30,000 USD. Courtesy Sotheby's.
the wide trumpet mouth tapering to a waisted cylinder resting on a small flared foot, the middle section cast in relief with a pair of taotie masks divided down the center with raised flanges, all between upright plantain leaves and snakes around the neck and a further pair of masks around the foot, the dry surface with malachite and cuprite encrustation.
Note: The two-character inscription consists of the cyclical graph ji and a graph that appears to be qiu. A similar vessel excavated at Fangduicun, Hongdong county, Shanxi province and now in the Shanxi Provincial Museum is illustrated in Selected Cultural relics from Local Museums in Shanxi: Bronzes, Taiyuan, n.d., pl. 60; other ding of this form are included in Robert W. Bagley, Shang Ritual Bronzes from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections, Washington D.C., 1987, nos. 93-95, together with comparisons from other collections, pp. 487-494. See also a ding excavated from the no. 160 tomb site at the west of Guojiazhuang, Anyang city, Henan province, illustrated in Zhongguo qingtongqi quanji, vol. 2, Beijing, 1997, pl. 58. A related ding was sold in our London rooms, 7th June 2000, lot 17; and another from the Hwa Family collection, also in our London rooms, 15th March 1973, lot 412, and again at Christie's Hong Kong, 7th July 2003, lot 611.
Sotheby's. Fine Chinese Ceramics & Works of Art, New York, 31 mars 2005