Page 91 - Sotheby's NYC September 20 2022 Forging An Empire Bronzes

Cheng of Zhou conferred Xiong Yi 熊繹 at Chu, with the clan name Mi 羋. He was given a hereditary title
and land to live in Danyang 丹陽, which some scholars believe to be near today’s Zigui county, Hubei
province (see Yang Kuan, 2003, pp 629-630). The Chu clan started as a humble subordinate to the Zhou
court. The ancient Chinese literature Guoyu: Jinyu (Discourses of the States: Discourses of Jin) records
that King Cheng of Zhou called for an important meeting at Qiyang with leaders of his vassal states and
the neighboring clans. Xiong Yi was assigned to prepare the seats for the leaders. During the meeting, he
was positioned to guard the fire at the meeting place. The Chujing people were considered by the Zhou
as barbarians from the south and were not respected by the noble classes in the north. Therefore, Yang
Kuan concludes that the Chujing’s loyalty to the Zhou court was only temporary and never strong (2003,
pp 632-633).

By the reign of King Zhao, the submission of Chujing to the Western Zhou court came to an end. The
inscription of the Guo Bo Gui 過伯簋, which was included by Wang Qi in a list of bronzes pertaining to
the two military campaigns of King Zhao, affirms the Chujing’s betrayal (see Wang Qi, 2016, p. 43).
This had provoked the king’s first military action to the south. Zhushu jinian records ‘On the 16th year,
the king mounted a military campaign against the Chujing’. Li Xueqin has been able to produce a
timeline of the campaign by reconstructing its progress through the inscriptions of related bronzes. Li
established that the campaign began on the 9th month of the 15th year of King Zhao and ended by the
8th month of the 16th year (2006, pp 130-131). Based on the studies by Li Xueqin (2006, p. 130), Zhao Fig. 5 A map indicating the possible route taken by King Zhao’s army in conquering the Chujing, original version of the map
Yanjiao and Wu Weihua (2018, p. 51) on several locations recorded in the related bronze inscriptions, illustrated in Michael Loewe & Edward L . Shaughnessy, eds, The Cambridge History of Ancient China. From the Origins of
Civilisation to 221 B.C., Cambridge, 1999, p. 313
it is possible to outline an approximate route taken by the king’s army which started at Chengzhou
圖五 昭王南征楚荊路綫圖 地圖原版錄於魯惟一及夏含夷編，《劍橋中國上古史：從文明的起源到公元前221 年》，劍橋，1999
(today’s Luoyang) (fig. 5). 年，頁313

Yi Yu, the owner of the present bronze, was among the very few recorded individuals who participated in
King Zhao’s conquest of the Chujing. While little is known about Yi Yu’s identity, he was undoubtedly an
important military official who served under the king and contributed in the attack against the enemy.
As a result, he was rewarded and subsequently ordered the present bronze to honor his father. In Shortly after his first success in the south, King Zhao initiated a more ambitious second campaign
addition to this gui, a bronze gong cover is recorded to have been commissioned by him. The cover was from the Zhou capital, Zongzhou (today’s Xi’an). Little did he know that this was a one-way journey to a
excavated in 1966 from a Western Zhou hoard in Famen town, Fufeng county, Shaanxi province, now in dramatic ending of his life, which was to “have lasting and far-reaching repercussions” to the future of his
the Fufeng County Museum, Baoji, published in Zhang Tianen, op. cit., vol. 3, no. 287. Zhao Pingan (2001, empire, as stated by Edward Shaughnessy (1999, p. 322).
p. 80) interprets the inscription (fig. 6) as a record of Yi Yu’s successful completion of an assignment to
purchase horses and cast this bronze to commemorate his father. It is possible that his assignment was “The light of five colors penetrated the Ziwei star at night. This year, the king never returned.”
ordered by King Zhao in preparation for his military expedition. Bamboo Annals

楚荊又名楚，系西周南部氏族。《史記・楚世家》 至昭王治國，楚荊已不順周室。王祁梳理昭王南征 頁51）就相關青銅銘文所含地點之論述，可推知王 年陝西省扶風縣法門鎮西周遺址出土，現藏寶雞市
有載，周成王封楚人熊繹於丹陽，賜姓羋；有學者 青銅器群，其中，過伯簋銘即記有「王伐反荊」之 師兵起成周（今洛陽）討伐楚荊之路線（圖五）。 扶風縣博物館，錄張天恩，前述出處，卷3，編號
稱，丹陽近今湖北省秭歸縣（見楊寬，2003年，頁 語（見王祁，2016年，頁43）。楚荊叛亂，昭王初 隨昭王伐楚之將帥鮮有記載，鑄此簋者 馭則為其 287。其銘文（圖六）經趙平安釋（2001年，頁80）
629-630）。周初，楚歸附於周室，然地位不高。據 次南征。《竹書紀年》載，「周昭王十六年，伐楚 一。 馭生平不詳，然無疑是昭王麾下重要將領， ，述 馭採買戰馬不辱使命，後鑄此器以敬其父。
《國語・晉語》所載，「昔成王盟諸侯于岐陽」， 荊」；李學勤考究相關青銅銘文，還原始末，得出 奮戰挫敵，因戰功卓絕， 馭獲賞，乃鑄此簋以敬 此採買之舉可能為昭王授命，以備戰事。
熊繹只得「置茅蕝，設望表」並「與鮮牟守燎」， 南征排譜，推算是次南征始於周昭王十五年九月， 先父。除此簋外，另有 馭觥蓋見載，該觥蓋1966 首次南征不久，昭王由宗周（今西安）二度起兵南
周朝更視「楚為荊蠻……故不與盟」。依此，如楊 終於十六年八月（2006年，頁130-131）。結合李學 征，然此行最終以昭王不復而結束，實始料未及，
寬所述，楚荊對周室之忠既不長久也非竭誠（2003 勤（2006年，頁130）、趙燕姣及吳偉華（2018年，
年，頁632-633）。

88 POWER / CONQUEST: THE FORGING OF EMPIRES