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Lot Essay
Pan were shallow basins used as ritual vessels to hold water. They were used in conjunction with a pouring vessel, he or yi, to form a set of vessels for the washing of hands. They would have been included in the ritual vessel sets used to perform the food and wine offerings to the ancestors.
Of the pan with similar interior decoration that have been published, all have the same coiled dragon/snake with large horned head immediately surrounded by a dragon and various animals and/or glyphs set below a row of animals. One of these excavated from the Shang dynasty tomb of Fu Hao, Anyang, Henan province, is illustrated by Jay Xu, "The Diamond-back Dragon of the Late Shang Period", Orientations, May 1998, pp. 42-54, figs. 14a & b. Also illustrated, figs. 1a & b, is a pan in the Freer Gallery of Art. On both the Fu Hao and Freer examples the upper row depicts dragons, fish and birds arranged in three groups proceeding counterclockwise below the rim, as on the present pan, however, the body of the dragon is filled with lozenge pattern rather than the scale pattern of the present vessel.
Two different types of scale pattern can be seen on the dragons of two other similar pan: one in the British Museum illustrated by W. Watson, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, pl. 26a & b, the other in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Mayer illustrated by M. Loehr, Ritual Vessels of Bronze Age China, Asia House Gallery, 1968, no. 28, and subsequently sold in our London rooms, 24-25 June 1974, lot 227. The British Museum vessel also has the procession of alternating dragons, fish and birds below the rim, which on the Mayer pan is replaced by a row of twelve angular S-shaped dragons with heads similar to that of the main dragon.
A Technical Examination Report is available upon request.
Of the pan with similar interior decoration that have been published, all have the same coiled dragon/snake with large horned head immediately surrounded by a dragon and various animals and/or glyphs set below a row of animals. One of these excavated from the Shang dynasty tomb of Fu Hao, Anyang, Henan province, is illustrated by Jay Xu, "The Diamond-back Dragon of the Late Shang Period", Orientations, May 1998, pp. 42-54, figs. 14a & b. Also illustrated, figs. 1a & b, is a pan in the Freer Gallery of Art. On both the Fu Hao and Freer examples the upper row depicts dragons, fish and birds arranged in three groups proceeding counterclockwise below the rim, as on the present pan, however, the body of the dragon is filled with lozenge pattern rather than the scale pattern of the present vessel.
Two different types of scale pattern can be seen on the dragons of two other similar pan: one in the British Museum illustrated by W. Watson, Ancient Chinese Bronzes, pl. 26a & b, the other in the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Mayer illustrated by M. Loehr, Ritual Vessels of Bronze Age China, Asia House Gallery, 1968, no. 28, and subsequently sold in our London rooms, 24-25 June 1974, lot 227. The British Museum vessel also has the procession of alternating dragons, fish and birds below the rim, which on the Mayer pan is replaced by a row of twelve angular S-shaped dragons with heads similar to that of the main dragon.
A Technical Examination Report is available upon request.