Page 44 - March 16, 2017 Chinese Art, The Harris Collection, Christies

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42 THE HARRIS COLLECTION:
IMPORTANT EARLY CHINESE ART
A TURQUOISE-INLAID BRONZE DAGGER
NORTHWEST CHINA, 7TH-6TH CENTURY BC
The dagger has a tapering rhombic blade and a plain, faceted
hilt with a turquoise-inlaid taotie mask guard at one end and a
scrolled, openwork pommel at the other end.
10º in. (26 cm.) long
$5,000-7,000
PROVENANCE
Joseph G. Gerena, New York, 1993.
The Erwin Harris Collection, Miami, Florida.
LITERATURE
J. F. So and E. C. Bunker, Traders and Raiders on China’s Northern
Frontier, Washington D.C., Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, 1995, p.
127, no. 44.
公元前七至六世紀 中國西北部 青銅鑲松石短劍
837
A BRONZE DAGGER
NORTHWEST CHINA, 7TH-6TH CENTURY BC
The tapering double-edged blade has a raised median rib on
each side and issues from a guard cast as a mask fanked by
spirals at the base of the hollow hilt cast in relief on both sides
with a stacked column of dragon heads with rolled snouts and
curled crests which project along the edges and separate slits
on the narrow sides, all below a larger mask with coiled snout,
ruyi-shaped ears, and curled crest, which also has slits on the
edge. All of the heads have circular eyes hollowed for inlay.
10æ in. (27.3 cm.) long
$6,000-8,000
PROVENANCE
Christie’s New York, 1 December 1988, lot 140.
The Erwin Harris Collection, Miami, Florida.
LITERATURE
J. F. So and E. C. Bunker, Traders and Raiders on China’s Northern
Frontier, Washington D.C., Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, 1995, pp.
126-27, no. 43, and p. 49, col. pl. 10.
J. F. So,, ‘Bronze Weapons, Harness and Personal Ornaments:
Signs of Qin’s Contacts with the Northwest’, Orientations,
November 1995, p. 38, fg. 4.
Compare the similar dagger in the Idemitsu Art Museum dated
to the Spring and Autumn period, included in the exhibition,
Mounted Nomads of Asian Steppes - Chinese Northern Bronzes,
Equine Cultural Afairs Foundation of Japan and Tokyo
National Museum, 1997, no. 78. See, also, the similar dagger
illustrated by A. Salmony, Sino-Siberian Art in the Collection
of C. T. Loo, Paris, 1933, pl. XXXIX (6). In Traders and Raiders
on China’s Northern Frontier, the authors, J. So and E. Bunker,
describe how the dagger in the Harris Collection was cast in
one piece using a two-part mold, and mention a similar dagger
dated to the 7th BC having been found at Baqitun, Fengxiang
Xian, Shaanxi province.
公元前七至六世紀 中國西北部 青銅鑲松石短劍