Detail View: National Palace English: Bronze Gui vessel with dragon pattern and square pedestal

Work ID: 
M01B00055
Title: 
Bronze Gui vessel with dragon pattern and square pedestal
Creation Date: 
Early Western Zhou Dynasty
Start Year Date: 
B.C.1100
End Year Date: 
B.C.950
Dynasty: 
07 Western Zhou (c. 1100 ~771 B.C.)
Creation Place: 
China
Measurements: 
Height: 23.9 cm; Weight: 3390g
Material: 
Bronze
Form: 
Gui (food container)
Type: 
Bronzes
Subject: 
Dragon
Repository: 
The National Palace Museum, Taipei
Description: 
With the exception of the geometrical lines at the belly and on the walls of the square pedestal, this vessel is primarily decorated with animal and floral patterns. New trends conveying a sense of movement in the western Zhou is especially manifested in designs on the neck and the ring foot. The single-head, double-bodied dragon is depicted in a high relief, which emerges out of a bas-relief of thin thunder patterns. The dragonhead, in highest relief, is placed in the center of the vessel's body. The dragon's two bodies are decorated with thin and shallow scale patterns, and are in S shape opening out to two sides; along with the upward curling dragon tails, they form a surface tension of undulating wave forms, which expresses the swiftness and mobile qualities of a dragon. On the ring foot are bird motifs already existent in the Shang, but the tails here are extended and adapted into a decorative S-shaped motif that represents long-tailed birds. This elongation becomes popular in the early and middle Western Zhou. On each corner on top of the square pedestal, there are animal masks that resemble four pedaled flowers; on each of the four walls is geometricized dragon motif.
ImageV ID: 
M01B00055AS001
Rights: 
Lee & Lee Communications