gong BM-1968-0422.1

Period:Shang dynasty Production date:1200BC-1050BC (circa)
Materials:bronze
Technique:
Subjects:dragon taotie
Dimensions:Height: 23 centimetres (with lid) Height: 17 centimetres (without lid) Length: 30 centimetres (with lid)

Description:
Bronze vessel of the type called gong. The vessel is shaped like a sauce-boat with a lid. Its body, oval in cross-section, stands on an oval foot-ring; the jug is waisted where body and handle join. This junction is covered by a bottle-horned dragon head; a diamond-patterned body lies each side of the vessel. Other creatures decorate the lid. Large animal faces in relief cover the two ends, their openwork horns standing upright. In the space between the heads small snake-like dragons lie against a fine leiwen ground either side of a dividing flange. The decoration around the lower part of the body is in complete contrast. Creatures in profile, one on each side of the vessel, are suggested by large eyes surrounded by a maze of scrolls and quills without a background of leiwen.
IMG


Comments:Rawson 1987:The vessel is shaped like a sauce-boat with a lid. Its body, oval in cross-section, stands on an oval foot-ring; the jug is waisted where body and handle join. This junction is covered by a bottle-horned dragon head; a diamond-patterned body lies each side of the vessel. Other creatures decorate the lid. Large taotie faces in relif cover the two ends, their openwork horns standing upright. In the space between the heads small snake-like dragons lie against a fine leiwen groun either side of a dividing flange. The decoration around the lower part of the body is in complete contrast. Creatures in prodfile, one on each side of the vessel, are suggested by large eyes surrounded by a maze of scrolls and quills without a background of leiwen. Erligang and Anyang bronze styles are linked somewhat on this bronze.This gong is altogether rather unorthodox. Gong appeared at about the same time as animal-shaped vessels: both are present at Fu Hao’s tomb (fig. 7). One type of gong simply had a lid with a bottle-horned dragon head at the front on a rather ordinary body neatly divided by flanges. The other combined a bird at the rear and a tiger at the front, rather as though it was made of animal-shaped zun joined to an owl-shaped you. The British Museum’s gong conforms to neither of these major types, and it is possible that it is an early experimental vessel, standing, as Hayashi [Minao] suggests, at the beginning of this vessel type’s development.