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Lot 8017
A gold and silver damascened iron ewer, duomuhu China or Tibet, 15th-17th century
16 December 2014, 10:00 PST
San FranciscoUS$10,000 - US$15,000
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A gold and silver damascened iron ewer, duomuhu
China or Tibet, 15th-17th century
Of cylindrical form with a curving spout and a scalloped gallery rising at the top above a faceted loop handle, the iron bands applied to the walls displaying a cash-pattern highlighted in gilt and the areas in between stamped with silver leaf curls surrounding images of the Eight Buddhist Emblems above stylized shou- medallions.
11 1/4in (28.5cm) high
Of cylindrical form with a curving spout and a scalloped gallery rising at the top above a faceted loop handle, the iron bands applied to the walls displaying a cash-pattern highlighted in gilt and the areas in between stamped with silver leaf curls surrounding images of the Eight Buddhist Emblems above stylized shou- medallions.
11 1/4in (28.5cm) high
Footnotes
The distinctive scalloped gallery above the handle on this ewer appears in a group of porcelain ewers, described as in the shape of a Tibetan monk's cap such as early 15th century white glazed example with anhua decoration in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: see Suzanne G. Valenstein, The Herzman Collection of Chinese Ceramics, 1992, cat. no. 58, p. 64. Another example, in cloisonné enamel, also from the Ming dynasty and preserved in the Tibet Museum, Lhasa, is illustrated in Beatrice Quette (ed), Cloisonné: Chinese Enamels from the Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties, 2011, Fig.4.8, p. 68. However examples of the duomuhu from the Qing period have a scalloped gallery rising above the spout at the front of the vessel: see the Kangxi period ewer from the George Walter Vincent Smith Art Museum, Springfield, Massachusetts, also illustrated in Quette, Cloisonné, p. 104.
For a globular iron jar with silver inlay and bearing a Wanli reign mark in the Victoria & Albert Museum, see Rose Kerr, Later Chinese Bronzes, 1990, cat. no. 44, p. 55. Ms. Kerr mentions the applied plates suggest an armorer's work. In fact, the delicate tracery on this ewer finds a counterpart in two iron helmets discussed by Donald laRocca in Warriors of the Himalayas: Rediscovering the Arms and Armor of Tibet, 2006: cat. no. 11 - a multi-plate helmet of 42 lames in the Leeds Museum collection, as possibly Tibetan, Mongolian, or Chinese, 15th century, pp. 73-74; and cat. no. 12 - a multi-plate helmet of 32 lames in the Metropolitan Museum of Art collection, as Mongolian or Tibetan, possibly 14th-16th century, pp. 74-76.