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6006 See also a similar model founded at the Famen Temple in Precious
A RARE GILT SILVER HEAD ORNAMENT IN THE FORM OF A Cultural Relics in the Crypt of Famen Temple, no. 58. The Famen
PHOENIX temple can be dated, through a discovered stone inscription, to the
9th-11th century Tang dynasty, and had been sealed from the fifteenth year of Wentong,
The finely modeled crested bird with chased hollow body set off by a during the reign of the Tang Emperor Xizong (AD 873). There are pair
high crested tail and separately fashioned openwork wings attached of similarly executed phoenix birds over the lintel of the Famen crypt
through the body and pierced with two small holes at each tip entrance, illustrated as cat. no. 14. Tang pottery female figures are
suspending pendant chains, a further cluster of ornaments and chains often shown with a phoenix-bird ornament as a centerpiece in their
falling from the slender beak, the small legs inserted through a bed of official court headdresses.
delicately fashioned layers of lotus petals.
3in (7.6cm) high See a closely related silver-gilded hair ornament found in the Chifeng
district and published in Asia Society exhibition, Gilded Splendor:
US$10,000 - 15,000 Treasures of China’s Liao Empire (907-1125),, New York, 2006, pp
156-157. Both a Chinese and a Khitan feminine symbol, it is likely
九至十一世紀 銅錯金鳳形頭飾 that these ornaments were hair ornaments for an elite woman. The
hooked beak may also be related to the Khitan passion for falconry,
Provenance part of the ritual hunting calendar and conducted in the early spring.
J. J. Lally, purchased 20 December 1993. See Emma C. Bunker, Julia M. White and Jenny F. So, Adornment for
the Body and Soul: Ancient Chinese ornaments from the Mengdiexuan
On loan and exhibited Collection, pp. 19-22, 274 and 278.
The Denver Art Museum, 1993-2016 (Loan 795.1993).
See a similar model exhibited in the Reitberg Museum, Zurich, 1991,
from the Dali Kingdom, Yunnan, and illustrated in the catalog Der
Goldschatz der Drei Pagoden, no.22.
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