Page 30 - 2020 December 1 Bonhams Hong Kong, Fine Chinese Ceramics and Works of art

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A RARE ARCHAISTIC GOLD-AND-SILVER-INLAID BRONZE
DUCK-SHAPED VESSEL
Song/Ming Dynasty
Well cast in the form of a duck standing on webbed feet, its beak
transformed into a spout, the long curved neck decorated with two
stylised bands of archaistic scrolls, its wings tucked into the sides,
decorated with stylised scrolling designs, carrying a vase set with a
overhead handle, the waisted neck rising to a flared mouth cast with
two bands of floral designs, the body adorned with scrolls and spirals
with details picked out in gold and silver inlay, wood stand.
Archaic bronze ‘duck’ vessel, Spring and Autumn 14cm (5 1/2in) wide. (2).
period, Shang zhou yiqi tongkao, no. 695
春秋青銅鳧尊，《商周彝器通考》，編號695 HKD600,000 - 800,000
US$77,000 - 100,000

明 錯金銀鳧尊水注

The prototype for this ewer would have been an archaic bronze zhou
fu zun, published in the Song dynasty catalogue of paintings in the
Archaic bronze ‘duck’ vessel, Imperial Collection, Chongxiu xuanhe bogutu (Revised Illustrated
Zhou dynasty, Chongxiu Catalogue of Xuanhe Profoundly Learned Antiquity). This catalogue
xuanhe bogutu, 1588 includes bronzes in the Imperial Court Collection dating from the
周鳧尊，《重修博古圖錄》， Shang to the Tang dynasty. See two examples of the bronze prototype
明萬曆十六年 from the Spring and Autumn period, illustrated by Rong Geng, Shang
zhou yiqi tongkao, vol.2, no.694, p.386.

Compare with a closely related but larger gold and silver-inlaid bronze
duck-shaped vessel, Song dynasty, in the National Palace Museum,
Taipei, illustrated in Through the Prism of the Past: Antiquarian Trends
in Chinese Art of the 16th to 18th Century, Taipei, 2003, pl.I-39, p.63;
and another in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, illustrated by
R.Kerr, Later Chinese Bronzes, London, 1990, p.17, no.3. Compare
also with two related pieces dated Song Dynasty, one illustrated by
M. Goedhuis in Chinese and Japanese Bronzes A.D.1100-1900,
London, 1989,pl.79; another one in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
and illustrated in Chinese Decorative Arts, New York, 1997, p.8. See
also a closely related cloisonné enamel duck-shaped vessel, Qianlong
mark and period, in the National Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in
The All Complete Qianlong: The Aesthetic Tastes of the Qing Emperor
Gaozong, Taipei, 2013, p.199, no.II-3.9.
Image courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum
維多利亞及艾伯特博物館藏 Compare with a related but larger example, late Ming to early Qing
dynasty, which was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 3 June 2015, lot
3309; and another example, 18th century, which was sold at Sotheby’s
Hong Kong, 8 October 2010, lot 2720.

Image courtesy of the National Palace Museum, Taipei
台北故宮博物院藏
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