The most beautiful and fascinating artistic aspect of the Chinese ritual objects was the use of bronze. In ancient times, vessels were made to be used for drinks and foods and came in different forms. Some of the containers had accents of rounded and molded handles which rest on well-created bases.
Bronze vessels have a well-designed covering which depicts mythical images of mostly animals (Chang, p. 529). Since the beginning of the millennia, they left these vessels with shades of green. There was an addition of hues that helped in bringing a visual display of the art.
In the 12thCentury, bronze artifacts have been collected all over in China, and they have had prices attached to them. Some of these ritual containers were dug out in the recent times mostly just by mere chance by the peasants. However, as time went by, the archeologist took over the mantle of excavating for these rear models made in the ancient times that is the Chinese and the people of the western world.
For a relatively extended period, the collectors from China were not collecting ritual bronze mainly because they were objects which were from the tombs (Chang, 537). This mission to collect ritual bronze left for the Americans and the Europeans to accumulate. However, in the recent times, this taboo has had a relaxation of its restrictions and the collection of bronze from China are now sold to dealers from both from the East and West.
The most intriguing examples of bronze were originally from the Shang Dynasty. These are the oldest bronze, and they were in circa in the years between 1600 and 1050 Before Christ. There is even an archaeological record of this earliest bronze.
There is the bronze age of China which was inaugurated in the years 1700 to 1500 before Christ by the Xia Dynasty. This type of original art media became the beginning art media among the bronze of Shang. On top of that, the combination of technology coupled with creativity gave rise to the most prized bronze by the collectors. This type of lovely bronze was and still holds value in the world.
The Shang bronze were the ones which the people used as vessels to hold alcohol and food which they offered to the ancestors. For this reason, they the Shang bronze were made with much elegance and more individual creativity in their art. In these rituals, the highly rated Chinese took part in a communal gathering which also included the living people and the also the dead. However, the details of these rituals are few due to lack of enough and proper documentation of these events.
The lack of proper documentation affects the people’s know how of the material culture of the Archaic Chinese. When an individual who owned a bronze vessel died, the person and the vessel would be buried together in the same tomb. Not only the bronze vessels but also other similar objects that were in existence at that time remained inundated in the ground with the person.
The elite people refer to these objects by using their Chinese names. These include the bronze collectors, dealers, and even scholars. There are particular vessels which these people are after, and they most comprise of the vessels used for wine and the ones used as sacrifices. One example of the bronze vessel is a Ding. This vessel has the shape of a pot which is wide, and its mounting is on a tripod. The vessel also consists of two handles of which they are on either side of the Ding. The Ding is a cauldron used for rituals in ancient China.
There is also another vessel known as the Zun. The Zun is mainly a wine cup which is tall and does not contain any handles not even legs for that matter. There is also the vessel known as the Yi whose structure resembles a box which has a lid on top which looks like a building’s roof. Most of the bronze vessels have a quality that depicts quasi-architecture.
There is another wine cup known as the Zun of which it originally had the resemblance of a Zun but in the later days, its shape was more like of different animals (Chang, 533). There were also food vessels, for example, the Dou. The food basin is a vessel with the shape of a hemisphere both for its body and the lead. When the vessel is closed, it looks like a sphere.
There is also you which is a pot with a covering and having a handle which has an attachment on either side of the mouth. This is different from the Yu, which looks like a basin, as well as it has small handles. There are other categories of bronze which are not vessels. These include cymbals, drums, and weapons (Fang-Mei, pg.229). There is also military equipment which includes a pear, a jian, and the zu.
There was a particular technique that was used to make the Chinese bronze and it was known as piece-mold. In the making of the vessel, a mold made of the object in clay is subdivided into parts. Next, these pieces are placed into the fire, and then molten bronze is added into them. The bronze is composed of two materials that are copper and tin. In the making of the final product, the pieces are set together with extra molten bronze. This particular method takes a long time before the final product is complete.
Thus, other cultures had a different means of getting the final bronze product. They used a method that utilized wax in it. There was need of preciseness when using the lost-wax process. This preciseness is because the patterns were specially cut to fit the inside the elements made of clay. The surfaces had excellent designs whose resemblance was not customary in the Chinese art. However, they had a similar characteristic to the art of the Mesoamerican.
There is an element known as the taotie whose styling is that of the face of an animal. This particular element that is the taotie has many variations, and some are quite easy to tell apart while others are not. It has a more appealing nature than just a mask, and that is, it can take up the shape of a leg or even a tail.
Up to date, there is no any known meaning of the taotie. However, some may consider this to be a myth which in one way or another may not even be true. It is possible to have a vessel with some taoties appearing from any angle on the vessel. The decorations of vessels are quite numerous in number. Another form of decoration is the known as the leiwen. This kind of décor represents the clouds those of which are in the sky and in a way they resemble a scroll and also a key for the Greek people.
According to the Art & Antiques Magazine, the archaic bronze vessels are very rare, and they are very hard to obtain. The bad thing about these archaic bronzes is that they are not durable. However, the ones in circulation can satisfy the available market. In the current time, there is the Asia Week NY where a dealer company is showcasing its collection of archaic bronze which are fourteen in number. This collection has taken an approximate of thirty years to assemble, and the assembling was completed by a lawyer from New York known as Daniel Shapiro.
Among the collection, there is the Shang Dynasty gong. This vessel has the shape of a boat, and it’s from the 1200 Before Christ. The top of this vessel has a covering that has the design with the form of the head of a tiger and at the back has the shape of the head of an owl. There is a good blending of the two bodies of the owl and the tiger and on top of that, there are also dragon designs added on the sides to bring out a very colorful structure.
There is also another wine vessel known as the fangyi whose cover takes the shape of a roof. This type of ship was created in the year 1200 Before Christ and also has good decorations which are made up of taoties. This Shan collection also has one of the rarest musical bells that came to being in between the 10th and the 11th century Before Christ. To sound this bell, one has to use a mallet made from wood. Its main purpose was to be used during the ritual sacrifices and also in a military action to control the movement of the troops.
There is also another Chinese auction which is expected to be offering an archaic bronze from the West known as fanglei. The fast auction of this vessel, it made history for the Chinese bronze for costing 9.2 million US dollars. There is great fascination in the mode of collecting Chinese bronze. It has been part of the Chinese culture to pay attention to the past of the country through the organization of study of objects from the ancient times.
The beginning of the study was during the Song Dynasty in the years between 960 and 1279. There were a collection and the recording of long catalogs which had the exact description of the archaic objects which included the bronze and the jades. These catalogs were drafted by the scholars of those times. Lu Daolin wrote about one of the most famous archaic bronze known as the Kaogutu in the year 1092.
The writings were on a documentation known as the Study of Ancient Things, and it had ten volumes with a total documentation of 211 bronze objects. There was also another important book which was published in the year 1123 and it was known as the Bogotulu. These catalogs from the era of Song have been used by the Chinese collectors over the years up to the present day.
Theodore Duret was a collector from the French nation, and he said that for one to particularly collect bronze, they have to use certain books whose writing deals particularly with intended subject. The lead dealers now own these books. The first book is the Pou-Kou-Tou or rather known as Bogotulu, which had the first publishing in the Song Dynasty. This publication took place in the year 1200 AD.
There is also a catalog with descriptions of the ancient bronze and it was known as the Si-Teaching-Kou-Kieng. This catalog was put in place and written by Qianlong. On top of these books, there is also one known as Tsi-Kou-Tchai.
There has been a tremendous increase in the knowledge about the archaic bronzes over the last century. This knowledge has been so widely available because of the discoveries in archeology. This archeological event has taken place in Central China at a site in Shang capital. Continued excavation in the province of Henan which has caused a tremendous discovery of new objects.
In the same dig, in the 12th century, one of the most renowned bronze collectors had the place sunk in quest of finding these bronze vessels, but unfortunately, there was none. However, years later, excavation in the same area was done again but this time using recent archeological techniques. This new dig was started by Anyang and this lead to discoveries of artifacts which was proof of the historic excellence of the Shang Dynasty. The excavation continued and in 1976, one of the best discoveries were found. This discovery was a tomb that had a total of 468 objects made of bronze and of that figure there were 200 ritual vessels.
The Shang Dynasty fell at that time, but this did not necessarily stop the bronze custom. In the years between 1050 and 771 Before Christ, there was a shift in the techniques but still in line with the Shang culture. Zhou had an admiration of these Shang ways, and he emulated them. As time continued, vessels which were in the shape of animals came to being(Li, pg. 914).
During 770 and 221 Before Christ, there were more designs which incorporated silver and gold. This technique had much impact, and it also incorporated during the Song Dynasties. There has been a high increase in the price of the Shang bronze over the years. This price increase is because of the quality of these objects and thus high demand. Nevertheless, there are also fake vessels which are being molded by the Chinese craftsmen. This practice should worry the collectors but all in all, their quality is quite poor as compared to the original Shang bronze.
The collection of the events above is a clear indication of the beauty of the vessels of Shang bronze. The Chinese people attach these cultural vessels as a critical part of their history. The techniques used in Shang dynasty have resurfaced and are currently still in use. This resurgence is because their appearance is quite appealing and they are of high quality. This craft has been a source of income for many people in China. There is a great bronze market for these artifacts. There was a taboo that people of China should not collect the bronze vessels primarily because they were sacred and ritually placed in tombs. This restriction is not as strictly enforced as it once was, and people are once again collecting the bronze vessels.
References:
ChangK. C.: The Animal in Shang and Chou Bronze Art, 1981
David N. Keightley
: The "Science" of the Ancestors: Divination, Curing, and Bronze-Casting in Late Shang China, 2001
Art & Antiques Magazine, http://www.artandantiquesmag.com/2014/03/chinese-bronzes/, 2014
Fang-Mei, Chen."Some Thoughts On The Dating Of Late Shang Bronze Weaponry." Journal Of East Asian Archaeology 2.1/2 (2000): 227-250. UO Libraries. Web. 25 May 2016.
Li, Yang, et al. "Techniques Employed In Making Ancient Thin-Walled Bronze Vessels Unearthed In Hubei Province, China." Applied Physics A: Materials Science & Processing 111.3 (2013): 913-922. UO Libraries. Web. 25 May 2016.
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