Bronzes from the Eumorfopoulos Collection: No. 8. Hu, Probably from the Han PeriodAuthor(s): R. S. JenynsSource: The British Museum Quarterly, Vol. 11, No. 4 (Sep., 1937), pp. 161-162Published by: British MuseumStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4421992 .

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XLIV. BRONZES FROM THE EUMORFOPOULOS COLLECTION XLIV. BRONZES FROM THE EUMORFOPOULOS COLLECTION

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earlier', which at the earliest would place it in the period of the War- ring States (c. 481-221 B.C.). There is little room for disagreement here. Yet once it is admitted that decorative features from the Middle Chou still persist, it would be legitimate to place it at the end of that long transitional period (771-400 B.c.) which one might call the third phase of Chou culture. This period lies between the Middle Chou (946-771 B.C.) and the fourth and last phase of the Chou civilization, and it is almost spanned by the period of the Spring and Autumn Annals (c. 722-481 B.c.). The whole tui is covered with a beautiful patina of a deep malachite green.

Height 13-6 inches. Diameter across the handles 15.8 inches. Diameter across the mouth

9"3 inches. R. S. JENYNS.

87. BRONZES FROM THE EUMORFOPOULOS COL- LECTION.

No. 8. Hu, probably from the Han Period.

T HE hu

from the Eumorfopoulos Collection, illustrated on P1. XLIVb, belongs to a comprehensive class of wine-vessels with

no very definite characteristics. Professor Yetts' records the fact that the archaic form of the character for these vessels represents a vase or

jar, but the Chinese group indiscriminately under this head a large variety of vessels many of which would appear to share little in common. The very term is nebulous. For the Chinese admit that the hu ( ) and the square Au were called the chung (t~i) and the fang (Aj) respectively during the Han dynasty. From the same source we know that a vessel which was called p'ing (~#f) during the Spring and Autumn Annals (722-48 I B.C.) was in reality a hu. It is this confusion of names which must have led Professor Yetts to remark that, although this class of bronzes follows an ancient pottery prototype, Han examples are the most numerous.

The barrel-shaped body of the Eumorfopoulos hu stands upon a

deep hollow foot with a broad footrim. The long neck, which ex-

pands gently to the lip, is surmounted by a detachable crown, from

x Catalogue to Preliminary Exhibition of Chinese Art, Shanghai, 8 April to I May 1936, p. 13.

Y 161

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which spring four expanding perforated petals. Into this cover fits a stopper surmounted in turn by a stem from which project four further petals. Professor Yetts states that some of the vessels exca- vated at Hsin-chang possess splayed tongues similar to the petals which project from the cover, but he can find no parallel to the

stopper in any of the Chinese catalogues. The body is decorated with two t'ao t'ieh masks containing ring handles and four pairs of ribs, vigorously modelled in high relief. From between the second pair of the ribs on each side of the mask handles projects a small flat- headed knob, whose original use has been conventionalized out of all recognition. The neck, the base of the crown, the t'ao t'ieh masks, and even the calyx of the stopper are inlaid in gold with hooked volutes combined with triangles and diagonals to form a variety of intricate geometrical patterns. The body between the ribs has been treated with niello inlay in a similar manner, but on the footrim

only the engraved pattern remains, as the inlay, whatever it was, has fallen away. Until recently it was thought that all Chinese bronzes inlaid with gold or silver could not date back to earlier than the Han

dynasty. But in 1936 the Chinese Government sent over to the Exhibition of Chinese Art at Burlington House a kuei inlaid with gold and silver, which they dated to the Spring and Autumn Annals, and a yen inlaid with gold and silver which they attributed to the Shang-Yin period. Professor Andersson supports a Yin attribution for a bronze inlaid axe, of a type which we have learnt to associate with the Anyang site; this axe is in the Oeder Collection; while Wang Yiin in his work the Liang lei lien i ch'i tu shih reproduces a

yu, in Yin or at any rate Yin-Chou style, decorated with k'uei dragon inlaid in gold. But it is unlikely that the Eumorfopoulos hu dates back to a period earlier than the Han. The design of volutes is very similar to that on Chinese lacquer fragments excavated from Corean tombs which have been definitely dated to the first

century A.D. Professor Yetts writing in 1929 would appear to doubt whether this vessel is even as early as the Han dynasty. Whatever its date, it remains unique.

Height I8.9 inches. Diameter across the mouth 3 12 inches. R. S. JENYNS.

162

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