Page 112 - Sotheby's Junkunc Collection March 2019

124 AN SPLENDID AND RARE GOLD AND SILVER-INLAID BRONZE CROSSBOW FITTING
WARRING STATES PERIOD
戰國 銅錯金銀夔龍紋獸首承弓器

the rectangular hollow section terminating in a mythical beast head detailed with large protruding eyes and flared nostrils, its
lower jaw curving upward extending into a long sinuous neck and bird head depicted with rounded eyes and a hooked beak,
the surface inlaid in gold and silver with abstract kuilong and scrolls, the surface with some areas of malachite encrustation

Length 12⅝ in., 32 cm
$ 30,000-50,000

PROVENANCE 來源
Alice Boney, New York, 29th May 1957. 愛麗絲•龐耐，紐約，1957年5月29日
Collection of Stephen Junkunc, III (d. 1978). 史蒂芬•瓊肯三世（1978年逝）收藏

Fittings of this type have been excavated in pairs in association with chariots, and their function has long been a
research topic of scholars. A pair of silver-inlaid bronze crossbow fittings was discovered from a Warring States
tomb in Luoyang, Henan province, published in Luoyang Museum, ‘The Chariot Pit Found at Chung-chou-lu’, Kaogu,
no. 3, 1974, p. 174, fig. 1. According to the archeological report, this pair of fittings were unearthed in front of the
wooden shaft of a crossbow, near the left side of a chariot. Based on this finding, the report theorized that they were
fitted to the front of a crossbow shaft to support the bow, and the upcurved terminals were meant to be the aiming
mechanism. See a reconstruction drawing illustrated in Luoyang Museum, ibid., p. 177, fig. 7.

此類承弓器多數成對與戰車同時出土，其功用乃學者長久 此對承弓器出土時位置乃戰車左側，於弩木臂前方。該報
以來研究題目。比較一對銅錯銀承弓器，河南洛陽戰國古 告述，此類承弓器應置於弩木臂前端作承托弓弦之用，上
墓出土，見洛陽博物館，〈洛陽中州路戰國車馬坑〉，《 翹弧尾則為瞄準之用。重組模擬圖見洛陽博物館，前述出
考古》，卷3，1974年，頁174，圖1。據考古報告記載， 處，頁177，圖7。

110 JUNKUNC: ARTS OF ANCIENT CHINA