The Relief Plaques of Eastern Eurasia and China: The 'Ordos Bronzes', Peter the Great's Treasure, and their kin 9781407306872, 9781407336886

Table of contents :
Cover Page
Title Page
Copyright
PREFACE
CHAPTER I: INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER II: THE ROPE-BORDER SERIES
CHAPTER III: OTHER PLAQUE SERIES
CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSIONS
MAPS AND PLATES

Citation preview

BAR S2146 2010 BOARDMAN THE RELIEF PLAQUES OF EASTERN EURASIA AND CHINA

B A R

Beazley Archive Occasional Paper

The Relief Plaques of Eastern Eurasia and China The ‘Ordos Bronzes’, Peter the Great’s Treasure, and their kin

John Boardman

BAR International Series 2146 2010

Beazley Archive Occasional Paper

The Relief Plaques of Eastern Eurasia and China The ‘Ordos Bronzes’, Peter the Great’s Treasure, and their kin

John Boardman

BAR International Series 2146 2010

ISBN 9781407306872 paperback ISBN 9781407336886 e-format DOI https://doi.org/10.30861/9781407306872 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

BAR

PUBLISHING

Beazley Archive Occasional Paper

37 Gold plaque showing tigers attacking horned horses. London Market (9.8 x 5.7 cm).

CONTENTS PREFACE

1

I. INTRODUCTION.

5

The Sino-nomadic bronzes and stylistic analysis. The Altai and ‘Steppe Style’.

II. THE ROPE-BORDER SERIES.

15

Introduction. Descriptions and List of Types. Type Catalogue (solid plaques). Some other shapes. The Openwork Series. Type Catalogue (openwork series). The Bear/Wolf plaques. Epilogue.

III. OTHER PLAQUE SERIES.

61

The Treasure of Peter the Great. Introduction. The Outline Plaques. Aluchaideng, Xigoupan. Buckles, Flanged and Horseshoe Plaques, and related pieces. Asymmetrical, BP Plaques. Drop Borders. Bar borders. Other. ‘Punched’ and Geometric.

IV. CONCLUSIONS.

85

History and the Rope-border plaques

Abbreviations Maps Satellite photograph Plates Index

93

PREFACE

The ‘Ordos bronzes’ are well known to collectors and many museums, named for the many finds in and around the Ordos plateau in north China. They are frequently on the market and the subject of many catalogues and parts of catalogues of collections. They have much to tell of contacts and of iconographic inspiration passing, in both directions, from China and from the Steppes. That they should attract the interest of a classical archaeologist may need some explanation. The often alleged circumstances of much of their production is one more familiar to me in the west, with Greeks and Scythians, and, closer to China, with Greeks in Bactria, but I was further drawn to them for the unique quality and intricacy of design of some early pieces, and for the challenge they seemed to pose to describe and analyse them in the terms which have become more familiar to me in classical and near eastern archaeology - by subject, style and form. Not that this has been ignored by scholars who have dealt with them, but for the most part the studies have been piecemeal; individual examples are considered and catalogued, and parallels cited, but not systematically over all the material – which is indeed vast. This is an archaeological challenge to which I am well used, in vase, gem and seal studies, and it is my excuse for intruding on real Asian scholarship. I am dealing with what are generally regarded as belt plaques, not the many animal-only ‘Ordos bronzes’ of various forms and attachments, which may have been applied to harness or dress or furniture, and which are equally numerous; nor with daggers and the like. The main series considered here (the ‘Rope-border’ plaques, as I call them, from the decoration of their edges) begins with works of art of amazing intricacy of composition, combining a certain horror vacui with a desire to indicate all parts of the animal figures involved. This is a highly unusual phenomenon, only matched in Chinese art on some bronzes where patterns of animal and the abstract interweave, but to quite a different effect. Nor is it to be perceived in this compressed form in the arts of the steppes, and it is unusual at this

1

intensity anywhere in ancient art. It somewhat calls to mind tapestry patterning within a frame. Through most of the series the animal bodies are also decorated with a highly distinctive form of patterning, derived from woodwork. This style loosens and simplifies with time, eventually presenting just a relief or outline subject within the frame. The first plaques and their style must be the invention of a single studio or artist, deserving some recognition in the history of world art. The series takes us from over a century before the Qin dynasty ‘unification’ of China, well into early Han times, roughly from the fourth/third to first centuries BC. Coeval with them, especially in the later period, are other plaque series of different shapes and many of them far less ambitious. These represent more decidedly ‘nomad art’, even when their forms and iconography are employed for luxury items of some intricacy, of the type that reached Siberia, and which characterize Peter the Great’s Treasure which had been assembled there, and whether or not some were made by the Chinese for their nomad rivals. These series I treat in more summary fashion in Chapter III; most seem of the early Han period, second/first centuries BC, but they have distinguished predecessors. I make no attempt to list these exhaustively, and although the result may be some rather indigestible footnotes, these may give a lead to other scholars. It is reassuring for the analyst to observe that iconography, plaque-shape and border-decoration regularly go together. Over the whole period studied the interfaces with the arts of Scythians and Sarmatians are apparent, and noted where important, but the subject is only part of the far wider phenomenon of Eurasian arts, a daunting subject. And like all ‘art-historical’ studies it carries a historical element involving the nature of relations between nomad and settled (to put it at its simplest), as well as the behaviour of owners/wearers. Many ‘nomads’ of the areas we visit were virtually ‘settled’, while among the ‘settled’ Chinese many lived a transhumance ‘nomad’ existence. I address this as best I can in the Conclusions, realising that for many this should be the main reason for such a study. It is likely, however, in the face of the very plentiful material, that a mainly art-historical approach may lead more readily to conclusions of social and historical significance. I have long held that the making of lists is the beginning of wisdom, and others may be able to make use of this work in ways that I cannot.

I have relied considerably on the resources of the Sackler Library and the Chinese Institute in Oxford. Knowing no Chinese, I have had to rely on digests and summaries for details of much of the relevant material; and Miss Chia-lin in Oxford helped me with translations of some important titles and references. I use the spellings familiar in most of the general literature on this subject today: thus, Daodunzi, not Tao-tun-tzu. Geography is probably the weakest element here and it is notable how the place names met in discussions are so

2

seldom to be readily located on the maps that accompany them.1 Katheryn Linduff’s essays in Sackler 18-98 have proved most useful here. Areas are vast and maps of the area are generally skewed to keep relevant areas within their borders. It is worth remembering that roughly the territory from the 30th to the 45th parallel of latitude includes the relevant areas of north China, the Tarim basin and Taklamakan desert (Xinjiang province), north Afghanistan and the Oxus, to the Caspian. North lie Mongolia (around Lake Baikal), and, farther west, Siberian sites of relevance – the Altai and the Minussinsk basin. Several experts in Chinese and eastern art were most patient with me and encouraging in early days of study: Carol Michaelson in the British Museum, James Watt and Jason Sun in the Metropolitan Museum in New York, Elena Korolokova at the Hermitage Museum. Others have shown me their collections or sent photographs – Gilles Beguin in the Cernuschi Museum, Paris; Mette Siggstedt at Stockholm; Shelby White and Jennifer Chi, New York; Batya Borowski and Max Kunze from the Bible Lands Museum, Jerusalem; Luisa Mengoni at the Victoria and Albert Museum; Ben Janssens Oriental Art (London); as well as private collectors, auction houses and dealers. Others who have helped greatly with information and observations are Katheryn Linduff, Karen Rubinson, Jessica Rawson, Sascha Priewe, Sergey Botalov, James Vedder, Sheila Middleton. It seemed important to offer as full illustration as possible, and pictures, however small, have been freely quoted as aides-memoire from other publications to this end. My own drawings helped me to understand many of the more intricate Rope-border compositions, and I have included some of these (xeroxed directly from the pencil sketches, not ‘inked in’). Claudia Wagner (Beazley Archive) has helped me greatly to organise the pictures. In the text the illustrations are referred to simply by [bold] numbers, and their sources are cited in the catalogues and footnotes, with dimensions where known. The black and white plates are preceded by a few in colour, their numbers asterisked, since the gilding and silvering can be alluring, and for some there is the added enhancement of inlay.

1

I am aware that there are some shortcomings in this respect in the maps in this book but I have done my best.

3

4

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

The Sino-nomadic bronzes and stylistic analysis My first and principal subject here is a series (which I call the 'Rope-border') which can be readily detected among the 'Ordos Bronzes', that prolific group of objects found in the borderlands of North China, on the Ordos plateau (in the arm of the Yellow River) including Inner Mongolia, beyond the Great Wall and far to the west. The Rope-borders will be seen to maintain a certain stylistic autonomy over a long period, united by developing iconography and style, by their regular border pattern, and by their more limited distribution; also by their robustness in comparison with most other plaque series. I shall then go on (Chapter III) to consider in somewhat less detail the comparable groups of these other series of plaques, both earlier specimens and the more wholly typical ‘Ordos bronzes’. The distribution of these goes farther west and includes material in Siberia and in Peter the Great’s Treasure, collected for him in Central Asia and now in the Hermitage Museum at St Petersburg. The aim is to subject them all to a fairly basic stylistic and iconographic analysis, creating groups that might seem to have some historical association in terms of studios, place and date of manufacture, and which might, through their interrelationships, tell something about the cultural history of the period. This last aim, however, I must leave to others to pursue in detail, scholars better acquainted with all the evidence involved, beyond the bronzes. My contribution is more art-historical-cumarchaeological, using methods more familiar to me in classical and near eastern archaeology, but inevitably not without some historical speculation, here confined to the Conclusions.

5

The objects are all ornaments for belts, dress or harness, and some have indeed been found in situ on silk or leather belts, but they are not generally formed as buckles, with slot and tongue or hook, like others in north China, rather than, in our Rope-border series, with loops for fastening behind, and holes for lateral fastening to the plaque at the other belt-end. For belts they are regularly made in pairs, often with mirror images, but some may well have been fastened elsewhere on clothing or harness. There could even be an afterlife for them, nailed to the wooden coffins of their owners.1 An early example of the general type is from the grave of, it is said, a woman, at Maoqinggou (Liangcheng) in Inner Mongolia, where the tinned-bronze plaques carry simple linear figures of a tiger, and the rest of the belt has smaller plaques with spirals [1].2 Their appearance in association with women and children is rare, more likely for their intrinsic value and appearance than as testimony to women-warriors (well known in Central Asia) but it is not only warriors who might wear belts. The Daodunzi cemetery is particularly revealing in this matter of associations.3 The Rope-border bronzes are but one series among many, but they are the most varied and distinguished for their subject matter. They will be found to belong as much or more to the Chinese kingdoms as to the nomads, for all their apparent debt to the iconography of life on the steppes, without ever being quite in the mainstream of Chinese art until their latest manifestations. They form an interesting foil to the other ’Ordos bronzes’ and their rather exceptional, and perhaps not characteristic, golden manifestations in Peter the Great’s Treasure. These are series whose dependence on traditional Chinese arts is even less direct, and whose distribution is largely 'beyond the Wall', but they are all interrelated, in function and iconography. While the Rope-border series is treated in some detail in Chapter II here, the others are considered in Chapter III in by no means as detailed a manner: they are not listed and illustrated as fully, although I have tried to include examples of all the basic types and many variants. There too is some consideration of some probable forerunners in the north, going back to perhaps even the sixth/fifth century BC, and some of these bring us closer to the familiar styles in Chinese bronze arts, as well as others yet more distant. The assumption has been that most of these bronzes were made for the use of the powerful nomad neighbours of China, for the Yuezhi (Rouzhi, Ruzhi), and, especially in the Han period, for the Xiongnu, mainly in the last four centuries BC; that they were made either by the nomads, or, in some cases, for the nomads in Chinese workshops, as rich gifts for 1

Minns, Nomads 30. There is also a considerable afterlife in the east in the practice of making rectangular plaques, of bronze, gold or jade, with patterned borders and animal devices for fixing to belts or harness; e.g., even Tibetan harness of the 19th/20th century AD: D.J. La Rocca, Warriors of the Himalayas (New York 2006) no. 124 - key pattern borders, Han-style dragons. And there is also a rich afterlife in the west in the works of invaders from the east, Huns, Avars, Alans, etc., and in the native products of Georgia. 2 Sackler 57, fig. A73; Thaw 23, fig. 31; and cf. ibid., no. 63, on which more, below, n. 76. Similar tiger plaques, Tokyo 1997, nos. 187-8. 3 Carefully studied by Katheryn Linduff in Linduff and Rubinson (eds.), 184-191; part of a series of essays on gender role on the steppes.

6

threatening neighbours whom the Chinese were almost incessantly fighting. A few early pieces, in the form of outline animals [251-254], are very like the animal styles seen on Chinese bronze vessels of the fourth century and earlier, and these, with some of the Ropeborder series, are more obviously Chinese in association. Equally, other outline animals have more obvious kin to the west, in the Altai. The outline animals are considered in Chapter III, but there is much also in the subject matter which was shared with the products of the steppes to the west, to as far as the sources of Peter the Great's Siberian Treasure, which sheds light on the later phases especially, and which presents luxury versions of some of the types commoner to the east. In art-historical terms this can be a challenging study since the art ranges from the heavily stylised, such as was practised par excellence on major Chinese bronzes, to the realistic (although never quite in Classical terms). It is a characteristic of Chinese art that it could be practised at both extremes, sometimes even on the same monument – a phenomenon most uncommon in the west, and indeed anywhere else in ancient world art. I have already remarked on the unique stylistic character of the earliest Rope-borders in the Introduction. ‘Stylistic studies’ are not much in favour these days, but we ignore them at our peril. The nomads were powerful, rich and well-organised. They were a real threat to the Chinese and were accordingly courted by them. The possibility of production of such objects for them mirrors roughly what had happened far to the west, where Greeks courted Scythian nomads from the late seventh century BC on and made objects for them, 4 although they were not threatened by them, at least not in their homelands. This facile comparison is in fact flawed, as we shall see, but the overall situation is similar. So this study is designed as much for scholars familiar with the west as for the orientalist, but also for those occupied with the understanding of archaeological finds through stylistic analysis, and who may be as intrigued as I have been with the finesse and complexity of the compositions that appear on some of the bronzes. There is the added interest of studying styles in art at the interfaces of major cultures.5 Interestingly, much early work on the whole class was done by scholars more at home in the west - Ellis Minns, the master of Scythian studies, who coined the term 'Ordos Bronzes' for the wider group, and whose account (1942) of the interrelationships of the arts of Scythia, eastern Asia and China remains among the best (Minns, Nomads), and Michael Rostovtseff, who was as well at home with the arts of China as with Classical history and society. The present study is also the work of a classicist, looking east. This is, of course, essentially little more than an art-historical analytical study, but it could lead to observations of more historical value if the groups distinguished in the two main parts of this work could be more closely located both in terms of studios and in terms of date. They have potentially much to contribute to the problems of settled/nomad communities in and 4

Cf. my The Diffusion of Greek Art in Antiquity (London 1994) 193-217; and The World of Ancient Art (London 2006) 332-339. 5 I explore this phenomenon especially in The World of Ancient Art (2006), including the oriental.

7

near north China, as has been suggested by Wu En, a major contributor to these studies.6 This is an area of research which must lie in the hands of experts more readily at home with the excavated evidence, and any relevant texts. There are thousands of our bronzes in existence, some hundreds of them published, with a number known to reside unpublished in museums and private collections, and an unknown number also in China. Sadly, only a minority accessible in publications are from excavated sites, let alone excavated sites with clear chronological markers. Literature on them is considerable yet the only attempt at some sort of systematic analysis in mainly art-historical terms was done over forty years ago by Edith Dittrich in her Das Motiv des Tierkampfes in der altchinesischen Kunst (1963), where examples were listed by the types of animal-attack shown (only four), not style or shape. This seemed the beginning of a Corpus, such as is sorely needed, but subsequent publication, which has been generous, has seldom dwelt on stylistic or iconographic groups rather than on detailed comment on individual pieces in the course of cataloguing for excavation or exhibitions, and for private collections, with the necessary comparisons pointed out. Mrs Emma C. Bunker has been prominent in this work both with publication of objects (generally those in American collections) and with discussion of their background, including the rich evidence from recent excavation in China – see her name in the List of Abbreviations. Bunker 1992a, b are especially useful resumés of the historical background, and the iconographical, from the Chinese elements to relationships with Peter the Great’s Treasure. A study of the collectors themselves might be illuminating.7 It should prove possible now to define more closely what in the plaques derives from a Chinese tradition. It is easier too now to describe what seems to derive from nomad and Eurasian traditions, especially in iconography, as demonstrated by the finds farther west notably in the Altai and Peter the Great's Treasure, as well as from excavation in the Minussinsk basin and elsewhere, since this also allows definition of significant differences from other products of Siberia and the rest of Eurasia to south and west. There are indeed several trans-Asian links. There is still room for a proper Corpus of types and finds, based on close stylistic and iconographic analysis, and adding the dating evidence from excavation, from Chinese publications. The need seems common to related areas of study: 6

‘On some problems in the archaeological study of the Huns’, Kaogu xuebao 1990.4, 409-437 (summary). And his account of the later, Xianbei sites in Sackler, 300-305. 7 Many are discussed in publications: David-Weill, Erickson, Glories, Heeramaneck, Heydt, Loo, Ortiz, Sackler (esp.99-111), Thaw, Traders. In the British Museum the objects with accession numbers 1950.11were purchased from Francois Cretinon, and had been collected by Henri Metz; and 1973.07- bequeathed by Mrs. B.Z. Seligman. Other major sources are publications of special exhibitions: Aruz (ed.) 2000, Berlin 2007, Croës 1993, Hong Kong 1996, Or des Scythes, L’Asie des Steppes, Rawson/Bunker, Tokyo 1997; and compendia, as Duan Shu’an 1995. Also, of course, sale catalogues of dealers and auction houses, and the resources of the internet. With such diverse sources and the movement of material it is likely that I have here and there duplicated references to the same items.

8

Li Xueqin remarks (1985, 124): ‘actually the Ordos Bronzes are rather heterogeneous. Monographs such as the Ordos-bronzen of 1936 [Griessmaier] include artefacts from many different chronological periods and of different types. Because of the major advances in archaeological work, we do need to undertake a more refined analysis of the bronze cultures of the north’. Most of the bronzes are relief plaques decorated with animal studies, although stylistically only remotely related to the 'Animal Style', as the term is applied to the arts of the Scythians and Sarmatians in the west, where the creatures are skillfully distorted, combined, and their parts exchanged. The term Animal Style still has, I think, value, if so restricted in usage. Many of the ‘Ordos Bronzes’ are in the form of animals or monsters, and these, fighting or heraldically disposed, account for most of the decorative repertoire. Many are rectangular plaques, with relief decoration which is either solid (with no openwork apart from attachment hole or holes), or more commonly openwork within a formal border, or with no border at all, and of various shapes, some simply an animal outline, which was the earliest type. Some, especially the later examples, are inlaid with coloured stones (mostly turquoise), coral or glass ('paste'). Technically these bring us closest to Sarmatian arts. Most are of bronze, often gilt, sometimes tinned or silvered, a very few of gold only, a material prized among both the Chinese and the nomads, but available in China in relatively restricted quantities from alluvial deposits.8 Material analyses are an important area of study for these plaques but cannot be pursued here. There is, however, one feature related to their casting which deserves attention. The backs of many of the special series studied here (see [38]), as well as several in other series, show that they were cast from models which had been made on a textile backing which was included in the cast, a technique demonstrated also in the finds in Central Asia (in the St Petersburg collection), but its origin is uncertain, whether steppe, where metal-working had a long record, or, more probably, Chinese, where the record was as long and more varied in terms of product.9 Hammering techniques seem unimportant, just as in other areas of early 8

Fully discussed in Bunker 1993. Rudenko 1962, 31, for the Siberian Collection examples. It appears also at Tillya Tepe for the inlaid roundels showing a Chinese in a carriage drawn by winged lions (first remarked in Afghanistan [New York, 2009] no. 106). Bunker 1991, 578-580, on the techniques, and Bunker and Ternbach 1970, for photographs of the process involved; a summary by Bunker in Traders 59-61, and 1992a, 204. The technique no doubt helped keep the very thin wax model stable but need not have significantly reduced the amount of bronze needed since the textile was soaked in wax, then replaced wholly by bronze. To my mind it remains a moot point whether the textile was applied to the original model (in wax, even if from a wooden or clay original) and thence reproduced in each copy, or whether it was applied to each wax cast before it was set in a mould for casting in bronze. The latter seems the general assumption, but it would have been a tricky matter to do this with openwork plaques every time one was to be cast; far simpler if the textile had been embedded only in the

9

9

Chinese art, and this is a significant difference from the Scythian.10 It seems likely that the initial models, of whatever material, possibly wood or wax, were cast in clay. Some have been found ([167] and the finds at Beikang [see below], as [44-5, 108-110, 116]). These served to create the moulds for making wax plaques, then cast in piece moulds, or by cire perdue, a technique whose date of introduction and usage in China is still a matter for debate. It seems possible that many, certainly some, of our plaques were mounted on thin wooden backers, one of which has survived on a different plaque type, 11 and many solid plaques have a shallow flange around the back edge which would keep such a mount in place. This might seem to strengthen the thin metal which could seem vulnerable, especially where the design is openwork or there is no rigid border, but the plaques are on the whole far more robust objects than any thin wooden backer, and it could be that the backers were for some other purpose or setting, even an opportunity to add a coloured ground in openwork.12 A principal feature which characterizes the decoration of many of the plaques (except the earliest) is an approximation to realism (even for monsters), however stylized, rather greater than that apparent in much Chinese art before the Han, except on a very few bronze vessels bearing friezes of small figures in low relief. Where there are groups of animals on our plaques, we observe either a straightforward one-to-one confrontation, or strict symmetricality, designed and executed with a scrupulous attention to the logic of the compositions, which in the early Rope-borders the eye often cannot detect at first glance. If the symmetricality is not apparent in individual plaques, it is when they are, as is usual, paired or when the design is mirrored in the same field. Without being completely realistic, even in poses, the animal groups are composed in a logical manner. Only in the twistedbody motif, which is both vigorous and an aid to compact composition, and in the occasional use of bird-head attachments to horns and antlers, is anything admitted which is closely comparable to styles farther west, while even the latter feature may not be a matter wholly of borrowing, but of steppe origin closer to China (see below), if not in fact Chinese. It is this quality of composition which first attracts attention in the finest (and earliest) of the main series discussed here, since it is not readily matched elsewhere in ancient art, anywhere. The composition is regularly mirrored either on each plaque or on pairs of plaques, for either side of a belt fastening, and the correspondence between the pairs is original model. The backs of identical plaques need close inspection and comparison. But piece moulding often leaves signs of the join; not conspicuous on the plaques. 10 The matrices which are common finds attesting hammering in the west (M.Y. Treister, Hammering Techniques in Greek and Roman Jewellery and Toreutics, 2001) seem completely lacking in the east. 11 Sackler no. 233 [222] and see Thaw p. 110. Also on a buckle of different type from Derestuy, Orientations July/Aug 1998, 34-35. 12 It is unwise to posit too much about techniques in wood-carving, given how perishable it is, but the survival of wood in dry Central Asia has been relatively good; for example, in the Altai (see below).

10

closely observed by the designer/artist. This is especially true of what seem to be the earlier examples, and the general principle remains true throughout this and other plaque series. Outside the Rope-border series, and for consideration in Chapter III, are plaques which are all openwork and with other border patterns, including openwork and plaques which are not rectangular, though also usually made in mirror-pairs, the shape determined by their fitting on dress. Their upper borders are wavy, with one or two low peaks (called variously P or B or rho plaques, and here BP). The subjects are animals again, more often feline predators, camels, horses and other 'real' animals rather than monsters, and there are even a few genre 'anecdotal' with human subjects, such as more rarely appear on the other plaques. Similar plaques in the shape of an animal alone, or with prey, with a natural outline ('outline plaques') are mainly earlier, commonly not in the style of the rectangular plaques, and more in a familiar Chinese and nomad tradition, and there are many also like the simpler figures of the openwork plaques. The whole series continues at least through the first century BC, and in debased forms beyond, by which time the Han Chinese had taken the measure of the Xiongnu, with resultant population moves for many nomads south and west. The general style helps inform Sarmatian arts, and even compromises with the residual Bactrian-Indo-Greek (as at Tillya Tepe), by which time little is left beyond technique, symmetricality and some monsters.13 The desirability of a Corpus of ‘Ordos Bronzes’ has been mentioned. This might be in book form or even as a website to which new pieces could be readily added, an increasingly valuable form of publication of such material as can never quite achieve a 'final' form.14 The principle of technical and stylistic analysis could be rather in the manner of Dittrich's, but even more dependent on shape, decoration, style and archaeological definition of object type than on iconography alone. 'Stylistic analysis' can be as scientific a process as any other in archaeology, when practised with close observation and understanding. It is a normal practice by now in western archaeological art history. With the ‘Ordos Bronzes’ it might link together many pieces which publications place separately because the subjects or shapes are different, and the links are sometimes observed only in passing in publications where the stylistically similar may be separated through considerations of shape or subject. Thus, where there is congruity in style, and there is a common subject with unusual treatment of, say, the border, the evidence even for the product of a single designer or workshop seems acceptable, and we begin to approach a true historical account of the series.

13

T. Sulimirski, The Sarmatians (London 1970) and many articles by Mikhail Treister. Bactria: Boardman 2003a, b, on Chinese and Greek elements at Tillya Tepe. 14 E.g., my Corpus of Classical Phoenician scarabs on www.beazley.ox.ac.uk; and, ibid., the material backing our publication The Marlborough Gems.

11

Such a Corpus needs compilation by scholars conversant with Chinese literature and excavations, since it is these that may provide clues to date and origin, and may offer the basis for a more reliable historical account of the whole phenomenon. 15 At present an extensive library of museum and exhibition catalogues is required. This is certainly not a task for the present author, who knows no Chinese; but some experience in comparable analysis of material in the classical world may serve at least in the following discussion of one of the more obvious (to me) stylistic groups. I find it interesting to observe, in the light of current debate about the role of collecting, that this is a subject whose course has been determined almost wholly by study of private collections, from Peter the Great’s to the present day, only recently being advanced by excavated material, itself made known to scholars most readily through the comment in collection publications, notably by Mrs Bunker, without whom now there would barely be a subject, rather than from Chinese excavation reports. The problems of the locations of workshops will be addressed below. Problems of date are no less complex. Sometimes a datable object can indicate a general date for a tomb or cemetery, or, rarely, association with an historical figure, otherwise documented, or an historical event, such as a destruction. It is sometimes more useful, or at least a priority, to try to get things in the right order or relationship, than to strive for exact dating, and it is a necessary preliminary step.

The Altai and ‘Steppe Style’ A major consideration in the study of our plaques and their kin has been to determine the relative importance to their style and iconography of Chinese art and of the art of the nomads, for whom, it has been presumed, the majority of the bronzes were made. It may therefore be convenient to summarise what of relevance to the plaques may be discerned in the arts of the Altai, which may certainly be regarded as too far from China to be much affected by native Chinese arts, yet certainly at the borders of if not within the sphere of major eastern nomad powers, notably the Xiongnu. Our main sources are the ‘Frozen Tombs’ of Pazyryk and related material from the area in southern Siberia. Dendrochronology and Carbon 14 analysis have suggested that the bulk of the material 15

There is a very broad classification of types (three), mainly the later, openwork, and not the Rope-border, by Wu En (‘a preliminary study’) in Kaogu 1983.1, 25-37, pls. 1-8; also idem, in Kaogu xuebao 1981.1, 45-62, with a fuller range of pictures and drawings; and see Tian Guangjin, ibid., 7-23, on some of the plaques, including some of our group, and the Xiongnu. See also S. J. Rudenko, Die Kultur der Hsiung-nu (1969). Drawings of the plaques are often repeated in articles in Chinese periodicals, not all cited here. Many are of rubbings of the decoration, which are engaging but not very informative.

12

should date from the fifth to third centuries BC (and, probably, later), rather earlier than, but also contemporary with, much of the material studied in later chapters here. And we may suspect that related finds to the north, in the Minussinsk basin, as in Peter the Great’s Treasure, run on through early Han times. For the Altai Rudenko’s study (Frozen) is a major source for discussion and illustration, and there have been subsequent finds to take into consideration also. The majority of the bronzes considered in this monograph are belt plaques, usually made in pairs, with mirror-imaged devices. Comparanda in the Altai are remarkably rare. A silver pair [2, 3] have a spiral border, unusual elsewhere, and the crossing lion and goat, not more closely engaged, are wholly in the western (Near Eastern rather than Scythian) tradition, and probably not locally made.16 More relevant are a pair of wooden plaques showing felines [4], with plain borders, but otherwise equipped with the oval hole for a belt hook, as many others we shall find in the Rope-border series.17 Another belt plaque [5] does have a beaded edge, more like ours, with a simple facing animal-head device.18 Farther west, in East Kazakhstan at Berel, are other wooden plaques, one with a fighting group and plain border [6].19 Much of the Altai material is wooden, and we shall see that wood-carving techniques are important on our Rope-border plaques, especially the Kerbschnitt patterns on animal bodies. This is not seen in the Altai though it is close to the treatment of some muzzles and ribs [7], 20 but never as a body-pattern. Far closer to other plaques in the east, the ‘outlineplaques’ of Chapter III, is the rilling of feline bodies seen on a wooden coffin [8, 9], 21 along with the motif of the predator lifting the body of its prey. Twisted animal bodies, whether alone or in fights, are a commonplace [6, 10-12]. They probably derive from Scythian art in the Altai but the motif travelled far. It is not so much a specially designed formula as an artist’s view of any fallen animal, its hindquarters twisted away from its head and neck, but it soon becomes formulaic, presented ‘vertically’. There is an exactly parallel phenomenon in Minoan/Mycenaean glyptic, 22 where too we can glimpse inspiration in the figures in the round of animals sitting on lids, with their legs going in different directions; there is an analogous figure of a seated cat on a lid from the Altai.23 16

Rudenko, Frozen pl. 67A, B. For assessment of Pazyryk, date and associations, see Rubinson 1992. From Al-Alakha, Arts asiatiques 46 (1991), 8, fig. 10. 18 Rudenko, Frozen pl. 140B. 19 Kurgan 11; Eurasia Antiqua 8 (2002) 269; dating, Arts asiatiques 55 (2000) 5-20 (early 3rd century BC). 20 Rudenko, Frozen 164, fig. 84. 21 Ibid., 268-9, fig. 136. Also necklace figures from Pazyryk, ACSS 5.2 (1998) 153, fig. 13. 22 J. Boardman, Greek Gems and Finger Rings (1970, 2001) 24-26. 23 Rudenko, Frozen pl. 93A. 17

13

Fighting animal groups in the Altai generally have a wider repertoire of postures than on our plaques, but are usually not circumscribed by borders, but may be, for instance, simply body tattoos [10, 11].24 [12] is from a leather belt.25 We meet a few examples of bird-head attachments to horns, which we shall see to be just as likely a gift from the east. The crescent-and-dot decoration for animal rumps [2, 6, 7, 12] is of western origin, not copied farther east, and we shall come across many other trivial comparanda.

24

Ibid., 111, fig. 53. There are similar tattoos on the hand of a woman in another Pazyryk grave, ACSS 5.2 (1998) 154, fig. 154. 25 Rudenko, Frozen 79, fig. 28.

14

CHAPTER II THE ROPE-BORDER SERIES

Introduction My name for this group derives from the appearance of the border on almost all examples, a feature almost never shared by plaques in markedly different styles, but which seemed to persist long for plaques in this, developing style. It is possibly inspired by chain-stitching for felt or cloth panels, but such twisted patterns are familiar in many contexts, and in earlier Chinese art. That the choice of border was not arbitrary is demonstrated, I believe, by the continuity of style and subject which the examples display over a long period of time, although there are a very few mavericks and imitations (or forgeries, ancient and modern). Virtually every ‘Rope-Border’ plaque I have come across fits easily into the sequence, and there is hardly anything without the border that seems to call for inclusion, except for a group of exceptional but clearly related pieces (the Bear and Wolf group, B/W). Both border and style need consideration, and should lead to judgements about relative dates, helped too little, I fear, by dated examples from excavation. The border is essentially a rope pattern with a double twist; some early ones have just one twist; some late ones, a form of three, or with the border reduced to a simple herringbone, while a very few still in the wholly familiar style lack any border at all (Type 22, the B/W). The simple, single rope border also appears earlier (by a little?), notably on two pairs of gold plaques from Aluchaideng and Xigoupan, decorated with animal fights in a very different style to that which initiates our group - one with rilled bodies [308], the other near-realistic, but with the textile backing [310*]. Both were made as belt-plaques with the usual holes for the hook. The rope pattern is Chinese, not ‘steppe’, and had been used as a border for figurative panels on earlier bronze vases (kingdom of Jin).

15

The execution of the figures in our group is relatively flat, and the earliest are generally with no perceptible relief although divisions within figures are more than just incisions. The best and earliest are solid. Soon the same subjects are executed in openwork, and there may be more relief, even if no more than slightly rounded bodies. The decorative patterns on the animal bodies derive from woodwork, expressed by rows of crescents in sunken conoid panels on limbs and torso, copying chiselling - Kerbschnitt. It had appeared on earlier bronzes, 26 but on bronzes it is mainly confined to our group and barely hinted at in the plentiful worked wood of the Altai, as we have seen. East of the Altai, however, at Sagly-Baji (Tuva), a bone plaque is decorated in this technique, and with a horse similar to those on the metal examples studied here, but also with provision for inlays on the mane [13], 27 and there are other examples of the style in ivory and bone, as on a cylindrical bead [14, 15]28. There are echoes of it at Issyk Kurgan in the west and on incised metalwork and pottery of Chinese type.29 In time the pattern becomes more like a conical spiraliform shell with a curl at the open end. So this is a wood-working technique that can be traced in different media, and our bronzes afford by no means the only, or even the earliest, expression of it in another medium, but its use for the belt plaques is quite distinctive enough to claim some sort of workshop unity in production, whether or not focused in period and place. Whether it means that the earliest plaques were wooden is another matter. It is possible that wood-carving may have seemed the most convenient method for creating the models for casting, rather than simply modelling them in clay or wax, but the pattern is in itself alluring, and this transferral of pattern across media is commonplace in the history of art. With time the distinctive Kerbschnitt patterning is muted or disappears in favour of spirals and curls, or plain bodies, something more realistic, but by then the succession in the series is made very clear by iconography, style and border. Although the style seems mainly foreign to the Scythian Animal Style, in its developed form it has something in common with the early Sarmatian gold (latest fourth/third century BC and later) far to the west (2500 miles from the Ordos plateau), as in the Filippovka kurgans north of the Caspian. Here we have the Kerbschnitt decoration incised or hammered on comparable animal bodies [241], many of them twisted, there is a tendency to beaky muzzles (even for a fish!), eared bird-head extremities, and other subject similarities – paired twisted stags, fighting camels. The parallels are considered below and they challenge us to find the link. There too we find examples of animals rendered in the 26

E.g., the curled wolf bronze: New York, Thaw no. 7 (= Traders no. 47), and cf. no. 63 [259], antecedent to our series - for the outline animal with prey, squared off; see also below. 27 Or des Scythes (1991) no. 149; length 11; there dated 5th-3rd cent. BC. 28 See Traders 138, fig. 56.1 = New York, Thaw no. 159 (bone cylinder bead; 4.4x1.6). And on early mirror backs, as Kimball-Davis 1995, 278, fig. 30. 29 Issyk Kurgan, Kazakhstan (K. Akischev, The Ancient Gold of Kazakhstan [Almati 1983] 78-83, 98-9, 1223). Another early pattern, seen also on daggers, is a line or lines of dots like beading, but this does not intrude on the Rope-border series except for a rare deviant border, such as [73].

16

'rilled' style of Siberia and a number of outline-animal plaques.30 Asia may be large but it was readily crossed, and at least for the features cited the passage seems mainly to have been east to west. There are indeed also some remarkable echoes not only of China but of our plaques and their kin in south Central Asia, roughly in early Han times: the bird heads, eared or not and set along a neck, coiled animals, cut-outs like our antelopes [130, 131].31 The plaques known to me are described and summarily listed below by iconographic Type but also, broadly, chronologically, and separating the solid from the openwork. I know them mainly from publications and some kindnesses of museum curators and collectors, and have handled several. There are two groups of excavated material, from two graves, which may throw important light on the early stages. The First is Tomb 30 at Xinzhuangtou near Yixian (Hebei province, some 100km SW of Peking). The finds included a pair of gold plaques, the finest (Type 1A [21*, 22]) of our earliest. They were in a cache with two other examples of our series (Types 4A [30, 31], 6A), and other pieces displaying the same decorative style on objects of other shapes ([117, 120-123]; listed below after Type 25). This has been taken as a strong indication of manufacture near by. The tomb is assigned to the late Warring States period, third century BC, and we can place it in the Kingdom of Zhao. Bunker (1992, 579580; and in Thaw 28-29) describes clearly the workshop activities of this area and period. Yixian was, it seems, a local capital, overcome at the establishment of the Qin dynasty (a development of the Qin kingdom, which, with Zhao, was one of the ‘Warring States’) in 221 BC. The third century must be the time when or by which the style of our bronzes was invented. However, the unity of style in the series, which can be traced well into Han times, suggests that the Yixian area was not always, or perhaps ever, the main centre of production, while other burial finds (not obviously of the same date, however) in this area seem to bear no trace of the very distinctive style, so the circumstances of the cache in the tomb may have been unusual, and are worth further consideration at this point, as well as more general speculation about the location of workshops. Tomb 30 is richly furnished with objects in many media, decorated in the expected purely Chinese styles of the pre-unification (Qin) period. However, unlike other tombs of the area, no doubt mainly earlier or much later, it also contained a substantial number of pieces which seem to suggest 'nomad' subjects, and a number in the Kerbschnitt style, which interests us here, and are in the manner of our series – the belt plaques, discs and other appliqués already mentioned. An example of an important motif - the line of eared bird 30

Aruz (ed.) 2000 for the Filippovka finds, especially Ann Farkas' assessment of them (pp. 3-17). New finds, American Journal of Archaeology 114 (2010) 129-43. 31 E.g., the gold work: K. Akishev, The Ancient Gold of Kazakhstan (Almaty 1983) 55, 59, 78, 80, 99, 104, 111, 122, 143. Enlightening essays on mainly east-west migration in Impact of the Environment on Human Migration in Eurasia (eds. E. Marian Scott, et al.; Kluwer 2004).

17

heads - is seen on a sword chape [16].32 A button [17] has what will be a familiar beaked monster and rows of eared birds, without the Kerbschnitt, and a pommel [18] a combination of familiar legs and eared heads. Other pieces are more obviously related to the pure Rope-border style [117, 120-123]. There are also various relief appliqués, including one with a human capped head [19] which perhaps looks racially nomad rather than Chinese, while several of the appliqués carry on their backs Chinese inscriptions giving their weights. Such inscriptions appear also at Xigoupan on earlier plaques of quite different style [310*]. On this phenomenon see Li Xueqin 1985, 334-336, who identifies the script and suspects work by the Zhao state, which had extended its rule across to or near the Ordos. What this says about the occupier of tomb 30 is hard to say - a local industrialist, perhaps, or someone with familial nomad connections of some sort, or a rich immigrant. Otherwise one has to judge that many elements of the style and its subject matter were acceptable to the local élite as well, which is perfectly possible, and will require further discussion, with the inscriptions, in our Conclusions. The second tomb find has been made more recently, at Beikang in the suburbs of Xian, in the kingdom of Qin. It is probably of much the same date as that at Xinxhuangtou, preceding the establishment of the Qin dynasty which ‘united’ China.33 It contained no less that twenty five models for the casting of plaques and other ornaments. Only one is a rectangular plaque of the familiar type (Type 7 [44, 45]), but there are three others of other shapes which are in the same style [108-110], with the rope borders, related to other examples of the relevant style elsewhere and listed with them here. Some of the other examples of what seems the early style found in several post-Qin contexts may, of course, be survivals, but there are very clear indications of some purely Han motifs on many others, and, if we are dealing with a real stylistic sequence, it was long-lived, possibly from several interrelated workshops. The other recorded finds of plaques in this style are not far-flung - none in Siberia, the Minussinsk basin or Altai, for instance (except for the odd poor maverick, Type 35B), and two precious curiosities, which travelled for their intrinsic value, no doubt (B/W 3, 4). Most have no provenience, which is the case with the majority of the objects of this type. The Daodunzi cemetery is rich in our series, and includes coins later than 118 BC, but all its graves need not be so late, given the presence of plaques related to the earliest of the series. Professor Linduff's survey of finds from the main areas (Sackler 18-98; fleshed out in Emma Bunker's catalogue, ibid.) suggests the various areas and dates of popularity for different plaque types - but not too closely for the Rope-border series studied here, all attributed to the Xiongnu. She has also 32

For examples cited in this paragraph see Hebei 1996, pls. 29ff. Katheryn Linduff gives a good account and assessment of the find in J. Mei and Th. Rehren (eds.), Metallurgy and Civilisation (London, 2009) 90-96. I am much indebted to her for copies of the illustrations and for letting me see A. Barbieri-Low’s translation of Yue Lianjian’s description of the finds in Wenwu 2003.9. 33

18

given us a valuable survey of the Daodunzi finds.34 Other types are often found to have wide distribution, and study of other artefacts, notably knives (mainly earlier), can be productive since there are some shared stylistic modes and decorative details, although not with our Rope-border series. A fuller combination of stylistic and geographic studies might suggest sources. The early group of our plaques represented at Xinzhuangtou seems to me very homogeneous, but there are derivatives and a succession, well into Western Han times. Some of what I take to be the early, core group, have been found in sites which are certainly of Han date. While it seems certain that derivatives of the style are as late, detectable by style and subject, isolated examples of earlier production are likely to survive in use for a generation or more - they are after all in the nature of being luxury goods, especially when gilt or even golden. If any studio producing the main group was in or near pre-Qin Yixian we should look for other locales in north China for later developments. And we always have to bear in mind the danger of reading too much into one prolific find in one grave (Xinzhuangtou), so far unparalleled near by, except at the exceptional Beikang - a common archaeological error. A minimalist view might consign our whole series to the third/second centuries BC. And the origin of the Rope-border series in China seems better established than for any of the other series of belt plaques (only a very few other early examples are inscribed in Chinese on their backs and none from the other main series considered here). We now turn to the style. The logic of the compositions on the plaques is sometimes best detected by drawings, such as some I present here which either 'explode' the figures so that each can be detected in all its visible elements, as well as the intricate interlocking of their forms, or which strengthen outlines in such a way that the separate figures are more easy to read. The early plaques have often defied accurate description in publications, yet every detail is significant and they are far from being any random assemblage of animal and monster bodies and limbs. Even in the course of drawing I have had to revise depiction, discovering a stray hoof here, a paw there. I try not to 'interpret' style and the photograph must be the ultimate record for this. So this account of them is offered for their own sakes, as notable examples of ancient design, as well as for their broader archaeological or historical significance. Close inspection also reinforces the feeling that several are the work of single designers, although the criteria are not strictly Morellian since very little can be thought to have been designed or executed instinctively rather than deliberately, or simply copied. Overall, we observe an emphasis on symmetricality and a very tight logic of composition strictly bound into a closely defined frame. This is not altogether un-Chinese in spirit, but it is foreign to the arts of the nomad steppes as we understand them - totally foreign to the 34

In Linduff and Rubinson 2008, 184-91.

19

western Animal Style, and almost as foreign to most of the other plaque series considered separately here. Where the latter too are confined in a patterned border this is not so sharply defined, nor so substantial, while the figures within it are invariably in openwork and loosely, almost airily composed. The many other plaques which lack any geometrical border are free compositions of animal bodies, single or multiple groups, restricted only by the general size and shape required for them to fulfill their function, whether decorative or as belt, dress or harness fittings. Of the compositional motifs the twisted animal bodies may well derive from the steppes but are not foreign to Chinese art. They are allowed to abet the intricate patterns of fighting bodies which, in Chinese art, may be more supple, less regimented. There are also some touches of the Chinese fondness for duplicated mirror elements and compositions, recalling the taotie heads; again, decidedly not a steppe fashion. The creatures on our plaques are chunky in bodies, muzzles, paws, hoofs and limbs, static rather than fluent, especially in the early types. This, together with their intricacy and precise composition, marks them off from later, derived styles. For their stolidity and absence of some features more heavily developed in the rest of the series (beaked muzzles, eared bird-heads, etc.) we might and should take the Xinzhuangtou plaques to be among the earliest. The repeated eared bird-head feature, an important one for much nomad art east and west to which we must return, appears in the same find, not on a plaque but incised on a sword chape [16], where the heads are not attached to anything but to each other. Now techniques. In other Chinese and nomad workshops there were different techniques for preparing plaques and small bronzes, which may also be derived from woodwork, with others owing more to metalwork: that is, modelling (in wax or clay) rather than carving. All these need stylistic analysis into groups and definition of their interrelationships, and have to some degree been isolated in regional studies (as in Sackler) although absence of many excavated examples and general diversity cannot yet lead to great confidence in results. For example, I have remarked that our series remains without any very close location in the Sackler scheme so carefully demonstrated by Katheryn Linduff, and localization is always going to be a problem given the relatively few excavated contexts and the fact that these are objects likely to travel far from their source. Thus, the cemetery at Daodunzi in the Ordos has proved the most prolific source, or at least the most prolific so far published in some detail. And we find there virtually all the plaque types distinguished in this study (including the next chapter), from some of the earliest Rope-borders on, and excluding only the very earliest (mainly ‘outline’ or unusual rectangular) and the very latest (Geometric and Punched, see below), which may run on into years AD, and even go with the Xianbei. This is not an encouraging observation for anyone wishing to determine origin by provenance. The plaques are, it seems, the commonest group of metal finds in many sites; they were prized, they travelled far, and their subjects and styles were easily copied.

20

Metal composition analysis, carefully treated in Sackler, is always problematic, since ancient objects of various sources could be melted down for reuse, in antiquity as today, and one can never be quite sure when some alloy innovations (as with zinc) were introduced. Observation of gilding, silvering, tinning etc. is a relatively simpler matter. The mercury gilding might be taken as evidence for manufacture in China and was surely derived thence. The problem of forgery also cannot be ignored. The plaques are relatively easy to copy and have become valuable on the antiquities market. Detection is via science and iconography, or archaeological assessment of whatever might be a modern cast from a genuine plaque i.e., details of finish, attachments, etc. It has been suggested that some of the gold plaques in Peter the Great’s Treasure were cast in the more impressive and valuable material from bronze originals, because they are said to shows marks of corrosion only possible on bronze.35 This might account for the concentration of solid gold in the Treasure, far less conspicuous to the east. There is a useful study of forgeries in Sackler Appendix 3, and Mrs Bunker has also explored iconographic problems in forgery.36 Some care needs to be exercised in all this since we are dealing with quite sophisticated metallurgy, with much experimentation in alloying, and the unexpected need not be a signal of forgery. Serious identification problems are provoked by over-ingenious iconography or stylistic absurdity, of which there seems little. A brief account of the zoology involved may speed the discussion. Close identity of creatures and naming of monsters is a difficult matter. Horses are prominent victims early in our series, but are occasionally promoted to monsterdom by being given short horns. At their purest, and earliest, they have their proper flowing tails. A partly beaked muzzle for some of the horses may be no more than a favourite stylisation and not a necessary indication of a monster, but it is more marked on derived styles and especially on stag-like creatures (where it is appropriate), although something like a short horse's tail may be kept. In some respects the beaked head is more like the muzzle of a camel, or especially of the saiga, native to the region. It is also characteristic of many fossil animals found in the area37 - a rich source of inspiration for monster types elsewhere. Moreover, many of the creatures given beaked muzzles and otherwise equine are given inappropriate cloven hoofs.38 I keep the name 'horse' in inverted commas, since their physique seems otherwise equine, though not when they clearly have antlers attached; Mrs Bunker has adopted the more noncommittal 'beaked ungulate' for them, which usefully embraces other animal sources for

35

Richard Falkiner pointed this out to me; cf. Arts Review 39.12 (1987) 432. See below; one piece has since been reprieved [140]. 37 A. Mayor, The First Fossil Hunters (Princeton 2000) 38-39, figs. 1.11, 1.13. 38 For many representations of stags in Central Asian art see N.L. Tchlenova, Artibus Asiae 26.1 (1963) 27-70. 36

21

some details, but seems a sad description for such a handsome monster - always prey not predator. Only camels and boars seem to fight back in this world. The felines are taken to be tigers, their stripes replaced by the conventions of the Kerbschnitt style. There could be no real ‘lions’ (who belong in India), but various leopards or smaller panther-like cats. The noses of the predators are often upturned.39 This looks like a gross exaggeration of a snarling wolf, upper lip curled back and nose lifted in the characteristic manner for the creature, but the muzzle is not slim like a wolf's, the paws are feline, not canine, and there is nothing else particularly vulpine about them (ears, tail, legs). The head type, including the upturned nose, has an earlier history in China, usually with a serpentine body (on jades), as it were, proto-dragons. On our bronzes they seem to become less rather than more vulpine with time, and may even be regarded as prototype Han dragons.40 There are some felines with heavy downturned muzzles, apparent in the monsters on some earlier Chinese bronzes too. The predators may also be horned, sometimes with twisted horns. These are all local varieties of imagined monsters. So far as I know the only Eurasian creatures with twisted or knobbed horns are rams (where they are short, incurved), ibexes (where they are knobbed, long and curved back), some antelopes (straight, slightly twisted), saiga (knobbed, recurved) - not yaks or cattle. Felines in Achaemenid Persian (fifth/fourth century BC) and Greco-Persian art may be given short recurved horns, thin and knobbed (or twisted), to indicate divinity or the like, and this was an art that stretched far across the steppes: compare the feline in [348*]. On the plaques the predator quadrupeds' paws are always rendered in the same way, whether for tigers, 'wolves' or, later, bears, even some boars, and are more feline than anything, showing the knuckles (as bears should not) and claws, and ignoring the canine paws of real wolves: a further indication that live animal forms were not important models for the designers. Ancient artists who were also meticulous observers of the natural world are the exception, not the rule; this was not their function as artists. Beaked bird heads, paired, are an early motif in China, especially on dagger handles. Later, and commonly eared, they may be attached to animals’ horns or tails. The device has been much debated and may derive from the west but is by no means foreign to Chinese art from an earlier date than the plaques (Rawson 1978), and was in use beside though not on the early plaques in tomb 30 at Xinzhuangtou (see above). It requires a little discussion. Birdhead attachments to horns or tails are familiar in the near east, at least as early as the eighth century BC; Greeks usually put snake heads in such positions, but only in later periods. While there seems none of this practice in China of the Shang and Western Zhou, the beaked bird head motif is a very old Chinese one. The appearance of its special steppe use, notably attached to antlers, is not easy to date. It appears as pairs of heads on steppe 39

On wolf muzzles Rudenko 1962, 38, fig. 35. On the unwisdom of identifying dragons before the Han see R. Bagley in Arts asiatiques 61 (2006) 17-29, esp. 27. 40

22

daggers, perhaps as early as the eighth century.41 It is in the west already by the early sixth century at Kelermes (a pole top), alongside animal-part substitution in the manner of the Animal Style, and so might be judged a product of the Scythians in a more easterly homeland. But how easterly? It seems rampant in the Altai of the fourth/early third century, especially on tattoos [10, 11], and, looking east to China, notably in the splendid gold stag headdress from Nalin’gaotu (Shaanxi) [20];42 but there is very little in the art of the Altai which suggests an origin close to or within the borders of China, although Chinese goods are certainly present. Here there is virtually none of the symmetricality of composition or the genre subjects characteristic of what lay to the east, and other associations in terms of any local style in art are with the west rather than the east. However, the appearance of bird-antlers on eastern 'interface' objects does seem perhaps to have been a gift of the steppe to a Chinese environment already conditioned to roughly comparable usage. It should be observed, however, that the rows of eared bird heads which edge several borders on our plaques is a development from the organically incorporated bird-head-antlers, which had suggested such a pattern for an upper border to scenes and creatures other than the antlered, and sometimes the heads are not avian. The common attachment of ears to the bird heads is a little odd. Greek griffins, from the early seventh century on, have eagle heads with upright ears, but with the bodies of winged lions, and they are allowed a function on the steppes but are probably not a major source. No Asian raptors have ears though some smaller birds are crested (kites), but the ears are attached to whole attacking eagles on other of our bronzes (as [357-365]) and their western kin. Some call these griffins or gryphons, which confuses the issue further, quite apart from real ‘griffin-vultures’. For the creatures on our plaques, whose prey are substantial, even yaks and tigers, we perhaps should not altogether forget the ruc, which was encountered by Sindbad (in A Thousand and One Nights), and known to Marco Polo, and could carry an elephant; or, in a real Chinese tradition, the monster birds on islands of the Indian Ocean (Pemba and Madagascar?) which can swallow a wild camel.43 We shall find more of these in Chapter III.

41

E.g., W. Watson, Cultural frontiers in Ancient Eastern Asia (Edinburgh 1971) 105-108, figs. 46-48. There are many studies of these early steppe daggers. 42 Traders 56, fig. 20; Sackler 50, fig. A56; Thaw 27, fig. 36, and fig. 17 for the familiar tattoos; Gold no. 101; and often. Height 11.5. 43 F. Hirth and W.W. Rockhill, Chau Ju-Küq (Taipei 1911) 149. Much also on the ruc in J. Nigg, Fabulous Beasts (Oxford 1999) 333-7.

23

Descriptions and List of Types A list of pieces known to me in this series and style, and all with the distinctive ‘rope’ border pattern or a close version of it, follows, with select illustration including some with explanatory drawings or in drawings alone. Each iconographic Type is given a number, and examples of it a letter (Type 1A, etc). The early (stylistically) fighting groups come first (Types 1-13), then other animal studies (Types 14-25), then a selection of examples on objects other than belt plaques which seem stylistically to be very close kin – a sword pommel, discs, appliqués, etc. [108-131]. All Types are presented first here in brief narrative descriptions, referring to the lists that follow. This is followed by an account of their mainly openwork derivatives, often with the same or closely related subjects, and which mostly retain the same distinctive borders (Types 26-46); and finally one special group without the borders but in exactly the same style and technique (the Bear/Wolf plaques, B/W). I have not dwelt on details of the plaque fittings to the belts - normally two or three loops behind, and hook-holes, usually on the right-hand (left, as worn) plaque of a pair - an important archaeological feature but not immediately relevant to the style, and usually well described in publications. Some smaller plaques have a loop incorporated in the border (notably the later openwork ones as Type 41), or have no such attachments, or may have been differently set on belts, clothing or harness. All are cast, many with marks of a textile backing to the original model, a feature remarked already. This may be commoner in the group than is suggested by those recorded, but it is not exclusive to the group. It is possible that simpler piece-moulds were used for some of the heavier, thicker pieces with flat backs. The gilding, silvering, tinning, or added silver foil are mentioned where recorded. Solid gold is a rarity (Type 1A; B/W 2). Here and there sub-groups are distinguished by deviations in border or form, labelled by small letters (Type 15a, etc.). These clearly derive from the main series and find no place with the other plaque series of Chapter III; many, not all, can be judged to be cheap imitations and play no part in the history and significance of the main series; or they are forgeries. Type 1 has the finest and most complicated of the scenes, the examples nearly identical. 1A is from Xinzhuangtou Tomb 30. On each plaque each half, dividing the plaques horizontally, mirrors the other (as also for Types 2-4; and vertically, Types 6-9). On each half of Type 1A [21*, 22] two predators are attacking a fallen horse, each with a twisted body. One predator is a ‘tiger’, the other has a horn and an upturned snout. The paws of both attackers can be seen at the border by the corners, and below the head and the hindleg

24

of the horse. Above the horses' heads is the frontal head of a twist-horned bovine (its horn is not serving also as a horn for the horse, as has been suggested). Mrs Bunker has observed that this head might be taken with the two isolated hoofs which lurk beneath the tiger's body and the horse's tail at each side.44 This would make the locale for the attacks - over the body of another prostrate animal - decidedly odd.45 More likely, the spare hoofs are from the one trailing leg of the horse (a motif that recurs – [30, 31]) and from its other foreleg. The most we can say is that the designer intended something which, however confusing to us at first sight, was composed with deliberation and logic. The facing horned head as a triangular space-filler can easily be paralleled on later plaques and elsewhere. Type 1B and C [23] are almost identical to 1A, while on 1D [24, 25] the extra hoofs are omitted, both predators have twisted horns and the non-tiger a blunt snout. More mirrored compositions on single plaques appear in Types 2-4, 5X. In Type 2 [26, 27] only one twisted predator attacks the horse, crossing it; while on Type 3 [28, 29] the horse too is twisted and is crested, and its attacker has a horn; and on Type 4 [30, 31] only the horse is twisted, and with trailing legs. Type 5 [32-34] is simpler, not mirrored on each plaque, and the predator’s head and two paws only are shown (on rump and neck), an abbreviation we shall meet again. An unusual feature is the fact that both the ears of the horse are given. Type 5X [35, 36] is a mirrored variant of the group. On other types the blunt horse muzzle is exchanged for a beaked muzzle and the creature may change identity. In Type 6 [37-43] the prey has a beaked head, wears two bird-head horns, and has a bird-head tail. It is being attacked from the side by a tiger of which we see only the frontal head (over the horse’s back) and two paws (on or near the legs). The horns with eared bird-heads here sit symmetrically on each head of the prey and can almost be read together like a frontal feline head - a possible visual pun such as may be seen elsewhere (compare Type 18). Type 6F [42, 43] is deviant in that the horns are oddly replaced by a crest composed of two eared bird-heads and a curled ram (a motif which we shall meet again), while the prey itself seems to have a crest along its mane with possible bird additives.46 Type 7 from Beikang [44, 45] relates to Type 6 for the bird-head additions, as also to Type 19, and is the most basic statement of the motif.

44

See White/Bunker on no. 21. She has also suggested that the creature is a takin, whose smooth horns should go sideways from the forehead then straight back. We should probably not press any too precise zoological identity. 45 There is no true analogy with the well-known gold plaques in a different style from Aluchaideng [308], where a prostrate bovine is attacked from the side by four whole tigers, making a far more natural group. 46 A gold plaque on the market has a crested predator attacking a horse (neither twisted), mirrored, with a frontal predator head by the fastening hole attached to two rear bodies. The double rope border changes direction at the middle of each side, and there is a textile-marked back. The bodies lack any Kerbschnitt patterning so this is a deviant invention, and perhaps authenticity should be in doubt: Gisèle Croës (Brussels) Maastricht Exhibition 13-21.3.1993, no. 16.

25

There are two other mirrored attack schemes where the division between the two groups is made vertically on the plaque, not horizontally: on Type 8 [46-48] the bodies of predator and beaked horse cross and the pairs are set back to back; on Type 9 [49, 50] the predator seems to lift the whole body of the twisted beaked prey, which has a long crest, in a pose, with neck upstretched, easily paralleled on Warring States to Han painting, textiles and bronzes (compare [466]).47 Attacks on other animals are not in mirrored compositions, but pairs of plaques do mirror each other. Type 10 [51-53], with twisted predator and twisted ram, sometimes with birdhead tails, is interesting in that there is a derivative version of the group in a significantly different style (Type 10bis [54-56], with the animal heads strongly stylised and patterned (the ram's eye, the tiger's face), while the group looks less well-knit and vigorous. This is presumably a deviant type, but busy and within the main tradition. Several were found in the second-century Tomb of the Nanyue King. The scheme on Type 11 [57-59], a tour de force, is unusual in that the twisted goat is given plenty of body hair, rather as are camels and, later, oxen, while the predator attacks by twisting its body around its prey, with three feet on the ground and its head between them. It has an eared bird-head tail and double bird-head flying crest, while its head is more wolfor even dragon-like. The heightened realism here (the hair) combines with a novel approach to showing the twisting attacker. The predator of the camel in Type 12 [60, 61] seems to have a horn with two eared bird-heads. In these we are dealing with somewhat more sophistication in animal detail than on the presumably earlier plaques, but combined with the same ingenious interlocking and twisting. They may signal a real stylistic break with the formalism of the early Types, but a formalism which is never quite forgotten in the more pedestrian subjects, and which is still intent on filling space. There are a few quartered rather than mirrored compositions: Type 13 [62-64] with a twisted predator attacking the forepart of a deer, and Type 14 [65-67] with a twisted predator alone and an unusual cable border.48 Small square-ish plaques have an odd rendering of a standing predator: Type 15 [68], with a long twisted crest, bird-tipped. Type 15a, b [69, 70] though having plain borders and no Kerbschnitt, must derive from these, or at least they find no easy home elsewhere. Two other small plaques with single animals, Types 16, 17 [71-74], have a crouching ram and a crouching ox (a motif commoner on openwork plaques of Type 41 or plaques without the rope border). Types 18-20 have symmetrical pairs or groups of animals, not interacting, ‘heraldic’. The commonest is Type 18 [75-83], of two twisted beaked deviant ‘horses’, horned and clovenhoofed, their tails ending in eared bird-heads. Side by side the tails begin to resemble 47 48

Compare the more complicated group on an openwork belt hook of different type [320, 321]. Also a western feature; cf. the plaque from the Altai [2].

26

another visual pun, by looking like a frontal ox head, while the striated curved strip below looks more like the real if slightly misplaced horse's tail. Not all the many examples of the scheme belong to our group and the subject is rendered in various derivative styles, some with more relief, some quite summary and flat, the bodies linearised (I list 18M-P [82, 83] for their rope borders). This is also a subject and scheme that appears earlier, far to the west (Filippovka [242, 243]). Other advanced, and so perhaps late, features are the way the hoofs are elongated. In Type 19 [84, 85] a row of bird heads is added above the horses with a large one central.49 This is a feature too of Type 20 [86, 87], with pairs of twisted goats, having an upper border of bird or ram heads. These are in the position occupied by the usually eared bird-head attachments to antlers which run along above a body on many other plaques, and it is surely these that inspired the placing of animal-head upper borders here. The Type 20 goats have eared bird-head tails, above which appears a frontal goat head, as it were a realization of the visual pun in the tails of Type 18 (and cf. Type 6) as well as the ram heads above their bodies. Type 21 [88-90] is placed here as an introduction to Type 22. Its coiled rams in threesomes are an uncommon motif, strongly recalling the coiled creatures of both Chinese and Animal Style art, but in this case they are complete creatures, without additives. Their rope borders are more complicated. In pairs they appear in Type 22 [91-98] superimposed on a predator body of which only the familiar horned head and paws are shown. Here the rope border is entirely abandoned. We have instead an upper border of antelope heads whose horns terminate in eared bird-heads such as elsewhere decorate antlers. The coiled rams are very carefully composed, and the upper border of the plaque usually terminates at the top inner corner with half a frontal antelope head. This intricacy and variety of scales seems a speciality of certain types only. The superimposition of the rams on the predator body is unusual but to the east, in the Animal Style, such a practice is more common, and it appears on a few other eastern plaques of predators, some more Chinese in style [271*, 272*, 351]. On [97, 98] the tiger’s body is abridged. The rams may be taken simply as a form of relevant filling decoration, not a matter of composing bodies from other bodies or body parts (like Arcimboldo). There is a close Chinese parallel, earlier and not in this style [240].50 The upper row of eared bird-heads appears also in Type 23 [99, 100], here with the rope border, over a twisted beaked and horned creature and a crouching ram, similar to that on Type 16. Types 24 and 25 are still solid, not openwork, and in the usual flat style though with fewer of the distinctive body markings on animals, and on Type 25 the border is plain. Type 24 [101*-106] plaques present carefully composed landscapes which most recall Han art, even

49

This rather recalls the head in the round at the rim of metal bowls, as Traders no.73. A bronze mirror with six coiled predators within a coiled predator: Berlin 1965-140, Tokyo 1997, no. 89; Ausgewählte Werke (1970) no. 12 (diam. 9.9); ‘8th-6th cent. BC’. 50

27

in the round, for instance the decoration of the 'mountain' incense burners, 51 as well as on inlaid bronzes and other works such as bronze relief vessels (lian).52 All but [106] have the usual double rope border. 24A [101*-103] is the most elaborate, with serpentine hatched lines representing hills and streams, and a variety of palms and similar plant life. Over the hills romp three boar foreparts to the left, three antelopes to the right. Below, two camels grasp branches in what we shall find to be a familiar group, and top left and right a twisted horse runs down the side border. 24B [104] is similar but simpler, all the creatures in the hills are boars, and there are small rampant tigers top left and right. 24C, D [105, 106] are generally more like 24A but the animals are again all boars, and top left and right are twisted rams not horses. With these scenes the plaque designers have quite broken free of any sort of steppe animal iconography, which is relegated to subsidiary features like the camels, and are providing for their customers a version of Han depictions of the countryside. Type 25 [107] goes with the landscapes, despite its plain border. The two camels beside a tree, and holding a branch in their mouths, appeared in Type 24, along the base line. The tree and foliage are in keeping with the landscape plaques too, and the subject is better represented in openwork plaques (Type 33 [153-155]), whose kinship to our series is clear enough in other respects and will be pursued below. The two camels are almost a trade mark for the later series. Overall, and on grounds of apparent development of style and subject, it seems that the tight-knit groups of Types 1-7 especially should be the earliest. They have flatter bodies, more mechanically interlocked to fill the field, where others become more naturalistic, ending with airy though crowded motifs inspired by Han arts.

Other Shapes The exact technique and basic style are easily detected on objects of smaller size, selectively listed here as Other Shapes. Most relate more closely to the early solid plaque types, so should not come late in the series. The most unusual are from the Beikang find. They are extremely small given the complexity of their decoration. [108] is diamond-shaped and carries a scene of a woman, 51

And in metal relief, cf. New York, Thaw no. 17, where two dragons play over a miniature landscape with animals. 52 Watson 1995, 91, fig. 159. The phenomenon well discussed by J. Rawson in Proceedings of the British Academy 117 (2002) 1-48, and in Arts asiatiques 61 (2006) 75-86.

28

wearing a flat cap with lappets and voluminous dress of nomad type; the sleeve is closely matched by finds of dress in a Pazyryk tomb.53 She seems to be embracing a bearded figure, seated, and also heavily dressed, while the ball-shaped object in the foreground is inexplicable – unless the top of another head; the preliminary publication sees a male youth embraced by a woman. The designer was clearly unused to expressing a narrative scene. Two other pieces from Beikang are designed in triangles, purposes unknown. [109] carries two twisted horses (?) sharing a head. [110] two twisted rams. [111-114] is what seems to be a plate from a sword pommel with a familiar camel on one side, while on the other a prostrate yak is being attacked. A square plaque [115] with a spread feline seems not for dress but other equipment. [116], a Beikang model, carries an intimation of our Type 6, with bird-horned ‘horse’ heads, here supported by a bird. There are other drop-shaped ornaments [117-119] and discs [120-123] from the same tomb at Xinzhuangtou as our Types 1A, 4A, 6A, which is a further indication, as well as their style and subjects, of their relatively early date and that the distinctive style of our plaques was exercised on other objects in the same workshops, wherever located. The drop-shaped no. 3 [118, 119] poses problems of interpretation familiar on the large plaques: there is a twisted ram, sharing its relief frontal head with a mirrored companion body, and with a frontal eared bird-head below it. It is being attacked by a twisted tiger, itself attacked by a twisted camel whose body is a jumble of somewhat oddly placed humps and long straight legs. The discs have comparable compositions: no. 1 [120, 121] has camels with which can be associated others (nos. 2, 3 [122-125]), where camels attack a serpent (?), or the camels may be attacked by predator heads in the familiar way, each disc with three recumbent camels, each resting its head behind the (single) hump of its neighbour. On one [124, 125], however, the camels are biting each other, while also, with some difficulty, a predator seems also involved, head only, appearing between the neck and hump. Isolated predator heads, active or not, seem a feature of the series in general and the composition of these discs, with rams, bears, ‘horses’, goats, exactly corresponds with that of the plaques. [126, 127] has a bear’s head boss and a distressed ram being attacked by a predator (paw only preserved). [128, 129] have simpler, single animals of the familiar type. Finally, there are outline appliqués of leaping antelopes [130, 131] for attachment, perhaps, to dress or furniture, very much a pictorial motif in keeping with Han art but stylistically exactly like our plaques. There are many other small objects decorated in a similar style, not quite so closely linked to our main series, such as the ubiquitous gold rams’ heads [132] which may also be used as part of a belt-hook of Chinese type [133].54 53

Rudenko, Frozen 91, fig.33. Revue des Arts Asiatiques 12 (1938) pl. 33.11 (Henri Rivière Collection). Among the many published gold plaques of this type there is one where the heads are decorated with tremolo lines - a technique more familiar in the west: J.M. White and E.M. Bunker, Adornment for Eternity (1994) no. 35. 54

29

Type Catalogue (solid plaques) [Measurements are given in cm. (T) - refers to evidence for the ‘textile-casting’ technique, where recorded. All plaques have double rope borders unless otherwise stated. All are bronze, unless otherwise described. References are to the most accessible illustrations.] Type 1 Two twisted predators (a tiger and another) attack a horse; mirrored. Single rope borders. 1A. [21*, 22] From Xinzhuangtou tomb 30.35 and 40. Gold. Pair. (T) 11.6x7.8. Hebei 1996, 716, fig. 1, 722, fig. 1, 724, fig. 1, pl. 27, pl. 143.1; Bunker 1991, figs. 8, 9; Bunker 1992b, 109, fig. 20 left; Bunker 1993, fig. 24.1; Traders 59, fig. 24. 1B. Mengdiexuan Coll. Tinned. Pair. 10.9x7.3. (T). J.M. White/E.C. Bunker, Adornment for Eternity (Denver 1994) no. 21. 1C. [23] Jerusalem, BLM no. 165. Gilt. 10.1x6.9. 1D. [24, 25] Pair. Gilt. 9.3x6.4. Loo pl. 23.3; Heydt no. 11; Dittrich 1963, no. 66; Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 29.1. The 'horse' is beaked. Type 2

One twisted predator attacks a horse; mirrored.

2A. [26, 27] London, BM 1928.12-7.1. Gilt. 9.7x6.4. Wannieck Coll.; Minns 1910, pl. 1.6; Minns, Nomads pl. 19.6; Watson 1995, fig. 137. 2B. Market, 2004. Transiart.

30

Type 3

One twisted predator attacks a twisted horse; mirrored. Single rope border.

3A. [28, 29] From Daodunzi, tomb 5. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.7, pls. 15.4, 17.5 (all of fig.9, cited often below, is reproduced in Bunker 1992b, fig. 21; and in Linduff and Rubinson, 188, fig. 9.10). Gilt. Pair. Bunker 1994, fig. 26top; Bunker 1993, fig. 26top; Sackler 84, fig. A124. Type 4 rope border.

One predator attacks a twisted horse with trailing leg; mirrored. Single

4A. [30, 31] From Xinzhuangtou, tomb 30.33. Gilt. Pair. 5.3x3.8(?). Hebei 1996, 718, fig.1, 722, fig. 3, pls. 28, 143.2; Bunker 1993, fig. 24.2. Type 5

One horse attacked by a predator head only.

5A. [32] London, BM 1929.1-16.1-2. Pair. 8.2x4.3. Wannieck Coll.; Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 25.3; Minns 1910, 15, fig. 1; Rawson 1978, pl. 5a. 5B. [33, 34] Gerena; New York, Thaw no. 100. David-Weill no. 47. 8.3x4.4. Type 5X The attack is as in Type 5 but the attacker’s hindquarters are added in front of the horse’s head, and the scene is mirrored. 5X.A [35] Market, TransAsiart. 5X.B [36] London, BM. Minns, Nomads pl. 19.6. Type 6 (except 6F).

A horned 'horse' is attacked by a tiger; mirrored. Single rope border

6A. From Xinzhuangtou, tomb 30.43. Hebei 1996, 724, fig. 2. 6B. [37-39] London market. Janssens 2007, no. 37. 9.8x5.7. Loo pl. 23.2; Dittrich 1963, no. 65 (fig.).

31

6C. New York, Harris Coll. With silver foil. (T). Pair. 10.6x7.4/5. Lally, New York 27.6.1992, no. 39; Traders no. 56 and p. 61.

2-

6D. [40, 41] London. BM. 10.2x6.6. Bunker 1970, no. 109; Watson, Handbook (1963), fig. 27c. 6E. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 836. 6F. [42, 43] Berlin, Ostasiat. Mus.; Berlin 2007, no. 51. 9.7x6.7. Tokyo 1997, no. 218. The horse with animal crest not horns, and double rope-border. Type 7

A twisted horse with a bird-headed horn.

7A. [44, 45] From Beikang. Clay model. 7.8x5.6. Type 8

A predator and a 'horse' cross; mirrored, back to back.

8A. [46, 47] London, BM 1950.11-16.6. Gilt. 8.9x6.3. Rawson, Ancient China (1980) fig. 158. 8B. [48] New York market. Royal-Athena Galleries, 21 (2010) no. 245. Gilt. Pair (both with hook hole to right). 10x6. Rope border with crescents between the twists. Type 9 A tiger lifts a crested 'horse'; mirrored. The version in openwork (Type 28) is composed in the other direction. 9A. [49, 50] Formerly Buffalo, Museum of Science 28132B. Pair? Gilt. 11.7x7.6. Heydt no. 10; Dittrich 1963, no. 61c; Bunker 1970, no. 111. Type 10

A twisted predator/tiger attacks a twisted ram.

10A. [51] Stockholm MFEA Gilt. 10x4.7. Loo pl. 23.1; Heydt no. 12; Dittrich 1963, no. 67 (fig.). 10B. [52, 53] New York, Dunn Coll. Gilt. 10.2x5.1. New York, Thaw no. 103. 10C. Jerusalem, BLM no. 9. Gilt silver. 10x4.7.

32

10D. Jerusalem, BLM no. 169. Gilt. 9.9x4.7. Type 10bis border.

As the last but with a different stylization of heads, and a more geometric

10bis.A. [54] From Guangzhou, tomb of the Nanyue King, 2nd cent. BC. Gilt pair. Several examples from the tomb: Wenwu 1996.2, 55, fig. 1.1 (Sackler 94, fig. A146); Nanyue 1981, pl.X.8; Nanyue 1991, pls. 4.1, 134.3-4. 10bis.B. [55] From Shizishan (Xuzhou, Jiangsu). Kaogu 1998.8, 18, fig. 23.2 (as the last). 10bis.C. [56] From Shouzhou. Stockholm MFEA K 11000-452. 7.5x3.6. Sirén Coll.; Ars asiatica 7 (1925) pl. 10.84; Karlbeck 1955, pl. 32.5; Dittrich 1963, no. 67a. 10bisD. From Daodunzi, tomb 14. 9.6x4.8. Bunker 1992b, fig. 21.12; Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.12, pl. 15.1; Wenwu 1996.2, 55, fig. 1.2. Type 11

A tiger attacks a twisted goat.

11A. [57-59] Eskenazi, New York 24.3-4.4.1998 ('Animals and animal designs') no. 8. Gilt. Identical pair. 11x5.7. 11B. From Guangzhou (tomb of the Nanyue king) - cited in the last. 11C. Jerusalem, BLM no. 99. Mirrored pair. Gilt. 10.4x5.25. Type 12

A tiger attacks a camel.

12A. [60, 61] Stockholm MFEA K 12070. Gilt. 10x6.5. Dittrich 1963, no. 73 (fig.). Type 13 A tiger attacks a deer forepart; quartered. All groups face the same way, not back to back as on 12A. 13A. [62, 63] Loo pl. 23.4. 13B. [64] Berlin, Ostasiat. Mus. 1965-130; Berlin 2007, no. 52. Gilt. 10.2x7. Tokyo 1997, no. 219.

33

Type 14.

A twisted tiger; quartered. Cable, not rope border except for 14C.

14A. [65, 66] Gilt. 8.4x5.8. Heydt no. 13. 14B. [67] Loo pl. 27.2. Probably the pair to 14A. 14C. Victoria Art Gallery. Till 2009, no. 64. Gilt. Pair. 9x5.9. Type 15. A single predator standing. Single rope border (A) or plain (a, b), the latter two related only by subject and general style, lacking body patterning and border. 15A. [68] New York, Levy/White Collection 658. 10.2x7.6. (T). Wannieck Coll.; Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 25.6; Tokyo 1997, no. 208. 15a. [69] Paris, Guimet Museum MA 3409. Gilt. 7.5x5. As 15A but significantly smaller. L'Asie des Steppes (Paris 2000) no. 115. Standing predator with twisted crest with bird head. Plain border. 15b. [70] From Guyuan. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 111. As the last. Type 16. Crouching ram. There is some openwork on 16B-E, and 16B, D have a pelleted border. 16A. [71] New York, MM. Gilt. 5.5x3.9. David-Weill no. 32. 16B. London, BM. Jettmar, pl. 25.2. 16C. [72] Jerusalem, BLM no. 170B. 4.9x3.4. 16D. [73] Jerusalem. BLM no. 170A. 4.9x3.4. Possibly once paired with 16C though with a different border. 16E. Bonhams, London, 5 July 1994, no. 296. Pair. 5x3.5. Type 17.

Crouching ox or buffalo.

17A. [74] Eskenazi London, 11-25 July 1980, no. 13 (once Stoclet Coll.). 7.5x4.3. Single rope border.

34

Type 18.

Two twisted 'horses'.

18A. From Xichagou. Cited, Rawson/Bunker 346, and Thaw p. 108. 18B. From Daodunzi, tomb 19. Gilt. Pair. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.13, pls. 15.5, 21.12; Wenwu 1996.2, 58, fig. 4; Bunker 1991, fig. 12; Sackler 83, fig. A122. 18C. From Korea. Cited, Rawson/Bunker 346. 18D. [75, 76] Heydt no. 14. 10.5x5.4. Loo pl. 27.3; Dittrich 1963, no. 70b. 18E. 'Paris'. Dittrich 1963, no. 70a. 18F. [77] New York, Calon da Coll. Gilt. Pair. (T) 10.8x7.1. Rawson/Bunker, no. 225, allegedly = Thaw no. 76; Tokyo 1997, no. 220. 18G. [78, 79] New York, Harris Coll. Gilt. Pair. (T) 10.9x5.5; 11x5.5. Traders no. 66. 18H. [80] New York, Thaw no.76. Gilt. Pair. 10.8x7.1. See 18F. 18J. [81] Stockholm, MFEA K1988-0013. 18K. Paris market, Asiantic 2004. Gilt. 11x ?. 18L. Jerusalem, BLM no. 161. Gilt. Pair. 11x5.5. The motif appears also in copies in an extreme linear style, with the double rope border: 18M. [82] Once David-Weill no. 58; Dittrich 1963, no. 70c. 18N. [83] Loo pl. 27.4. 18O. Devlet, 7, fig. 2.5.

Type 19.

Two twisted 'horses' with a row of bird heads above.

19A. [84] New York, Levy/White Collection 587. (T) 11.2x5.4.

35

19B. [85] Stockholm, MFEA K 1120-055. Gilt. Karlbeck 1955, pl. 32.4; Dittrich 1963, no. 67b. Type 20.

Two twisted goats with a row of bird or ram heads above.

20A. From Yinshanling (120km NE of Peking). Wenwu 1996.2, 56, fig. 3. Bird heads above. 20B. [86, 87] From Xichagou. Gilt. (T). Sackler 79, fig. A111. Ram heads above. Type 21.

Three coiled rams. Broad doubled borders.

21A. [88] From Daodunzi, tomb 11. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.1, pl. 17.4; Sackler 83, fig. A125. 21B. [89] New York, Harris Coll. Gilt. (T) 6x3.6. Traders no. 65. 21C. [90] Stockholm, MFEA K 11290-072. Gilt. (T) 5.8x3.4. Karlbeck 1955, pl. 32.3; Dittrich 1963, no. 67c. Type 22. Two coiled rams on a tiger's body, with a row of antelope/bird heads above. No borders. On 22F-K the tiger has an abridged snout and the rams are relatively larger. 22A. [91] From Xichagou. Gilt. (T) 9.5x4.8. Sackler 78-79, fig. A110; Hong Kong 1996, no. 150. 22B. From Shizishan (Xuzhou, Jiangsu). Kaogu 1998.8, 18, fig. 23.3 and 4. Cf. Thaw p. 100. 22C. [92] Stockholm MFEA. (T) Pair. 9.5x4.5. BMFEA 4 (1932) pl. 23.3; Dittrich 1963, no. 94 (fig.); Minns, Nomads pl. 21M. 22D. [93, 94] New York, Harris Coll. Gilt. Pair. (T) 9.4x4.5; 8.9x4.2. Traders no. 63. 22E. [95, 96] New York, Lally Coll. Gilt. Pair. (T) 9x4.4. New York, Thaw no. 67. Janssens 2007, no. 36 (left plaque; 9x4.3) seems from the same mould.

36

22F. [97] Eskenazi London, 17 June - 7 July 1989, no. 18 (once Michon and Vannotti Colls.). Gilt. (T) 8.4x. 22G. Jerusalem, BLM no. 118. Gilt. 8.9x3.6. 22H. [98] Jerusalem, BLM no. 168. Pair. 8.4/8.6x3.6. 22I. Berlin, Ostasiat. Mus. 1965-68; Berlin 2007, no. 50. Like the last but with a little openwork. Gilt. 8.5x3.9. 22J. Los Angeles M.76.97.563. Heeramaneck no. 835. 8.6x3.9. 22K. Victoria Art Gallery. Till 2009, no. 63. Gilt. Pair. 9.4x4.5. Type 23.

A crouching ram and twisted 'horse', with a row of bird heads above.

23A. [99, 100] New York, Lally Coll. Pair. 10x4.8. Thaw no. 99. Type 24.

Landscapes with animals.

24A. [101*-103] New York, Ariadne Galleries. Gilt. (T) 11.1x5.7. Thaw no. 116. 24B. [104] Private collection. Gilt ('two-toned'). 13.3x6.8. Traders 74, fig. 32. 24C. [105] Gerena Fine Art Gallery, 2006. Pair. Gilt. 11.5x5. No border. 24D. [106] Jerusalem, BLM no. 8. Gilt. 11.3x5.3. As the last. Type 25.

Two camels. Solid version of Type 33.

25A. [107] Taiyo Ltd., April 2005. Gilt pair. 9.9x4.7. Plain border. Probably ancient, with the usual hook hole on one plaque only. 25B. Known from a photograph only. A hook hole at each end.

37

Some Other Shapes Triangular and related plaques. 1. [108] From Beikang. Diamond-shaped clay model. A woman embracing a man. 5x9. 2. [109] From Beikang. Double triangle clay model. Two twisted rams. 6.4x4.7. 3. [110] From Beikang. Double triangle clay model. Two twisted horses sharing a head. 8x5 (?).

Sword pommel. 1. [111-114] New York, Levy/White Collection. 6.7x4.8. A. A camel. B. Two predators attack a prostrate yak. Single rope border but no Kerbschnitt patterning.

Square plaque. 1. [115] London, BM 1950.11.-16.17. 5.3x5.2 (no loops). Frontal tiger displayed, seen from below, its legs bent.

Drop-shaped appliqués. 1. [116] From Beikang, clay model. A pair of bird-head-horned horse heads, supported by a bird. 2. [117] From Xinzhuangzhou tomb 30.132. Hebei 1996, 718, fig. 6, pl. 31.2. Horses.

38

3. From Xinzhuangzhou tomb 30. Hebei 1996, pl. 31.3-4. Antelopes and frontal tiger foreparts. 4. [118, 119] Ben Janssens Oriental Art 2003, p. 23. Open centre. Mercury-gilt. H. 13.2. A ram attacked by a tiger, itself attacked by a camel.

Discs (various attachments for instruments or weapons). 1. [120, 121] From Xinzhuangzhou tomb 30.28. Silver. Hebei 1996, 716, fig. 2, 722, fig. 2, pl. 29.1-2. Camels. Inscription on the back. 2. [122, 123] From Xinzhuangzhou tomb 30.109. Silver. Hebei 1996, 716, fig. 2, pl. 29.3-4 (cf. pl. 29.1 for another mixed subject). Two groups of what seems a camel attacking a serpent, not easily deciphered. Inscription on the back. 3. [124, 125] Private, Hong Kong. Gilt silver. Diam. 9.5. Rawson/Bunker, 300, fig. 6. White/Bunker, no. 22. Camels attacked by a predator head and each other. 4. [126, 127] Gilt. Rams, with a relief bear's head central. Bunker 1970, no. 110. Bear-head bosses in this style are relatively common attachments. 5. [128] New York, Dunn Coll. Gilt. Diam. 5.1. Thaw no. 180. A beaked 'horse'. 6. Jerusalem, BLM no. 183. Gilt. Diam. 4.3. As the last. 7. [129] New York, Harris Coll. Silver. Diam. 3.7. Thaw no. 160; Traders no. 58. A ram. 8. New York, Ellsworth Coll. Silver. Bunker 1991, fig. 10. A goat.

Outline appliqués: leaping twisted antelopes, for dress or furniture. 1. [130] Hong Kong. 9.2x4.3. Rawson/Bunker, no. 234. 2. London, BM. Gilt. Cited under the last. 3. [131] New York, Met.Mus. Gilt. Hearn, Erickson no. 87.

39

4. New York, Harris Coll. Gilt. 7.9x3.2. Traders no. 78 and p. 73. 5. Private Coll. Bunker 1991, fig. 13.

40

The Openwork Series This series of the Rope-border plaques is easily distinguished from the solid plaques, but there are areas of overlap where precisely the same motif is presented in openwork, and the same or derived models could have been used. And since some of the solid versions (Type 24) must be among the latest of the whole series we must judge that the solid and openwork are coeval, but that the openwork are not of the earliest period, and that they need not indicate separate workshops. The openwork itself is often modest, and so not especially economical in material while possibly making the plaques more difficult to cast, and we have seen the occasional solid subject admitting some minor openwork, where the model was deep-cut. The compositions remain well fitted into the rectangular field, by no means as loose as those we see on the numerous other openwork plaque series considered in the next chapter, which are far flimsier and where the iconography and style are also in the main different. The openwork Rope-border plaques are far less engaged with animal fights, although there are some derived from or virtually identical with the solid versions (Types 29-34). There are far more studies of symmetrical pairs of animals, at ease more often than twisted, or of single animals. Once or twice a minor human is admitted (Types 26, 42), a very rustic fellow. One or two solid plaques have been included here (Type 36A, cf. Type 40) for their subjects and for the fact that they, in common with several in the rest of the openwork series, have lost partly or almost entirely the distinctive Kerbschnitt body patterning, which is, however, by no means forgotten. There is a tendency overall towards, on the one hand, more feeling for relief rendering of bodies, on the other, more sketchy treatment of popular subjects. Of the new subjects the most revealing are the few more wholly dependent on the practices of Han Chinese arts than on any of the steppe arts, with the Chinese dragons and tortoises (Types 44-46 [184-190]), and those which recall versions of Han landscape studies (Type 24 [101*-106]). The animal world, real or imagined, remains dominant. The rope borders are generally retained, double or single, but a few have plain borders, or none at all. The textile backs are still common. Some of the smaller plaques have loops attached to the side border and not the usual holes for hooks and loops on the back. Distribution within China and outside is much as for the solid and does little to help determine chronology or source. There are examples, for instance, in the tomb (73) of the second King of Nanyue (died 122 BC) at Guangzhou. Indications are that most are Western Han in period, probably early, and they accompany prolific plaque series in different styles

41

which are as well or better represented outside China. They cannot be divorced from their solid kin in either style or technique. There are, however, also plaques which seem to imitate our openwork series in their iconography, sometimes with elements of the rope border, and generally in far more loosely composed openwork - 'economy versions', it may be, or crude attempts at copying. Otherwise they are in a different, not just debased, style, some quite closely related to the various other plaque series to be considered later. I list some of these here with their model types, but with small letters (a, b, c) where the subjects are the same. These derivatives often resemble each other and so may represent a parallel imitative workshop or workshops. Some may even be forgeries, ancient or modern. And here and there a subject and even elements of style may be borrowed from other series, or more directly from Chinese art (e.g., Type 44 [184]). Any systematic listing will produce overlaps. We start with a few isolated plaques (Types 26-28) in exactly the style so far discussed, or close to it, although on some we miss all the detailed Kerbschnitt details. But they are mavericks, in that they lack the rope border altogether, yet the creatures shown are not altogether in their natural outline but compressed into an approximate rectangle without the border, and most are fairly modestly openwork. It is possible that they were set in borders of other material, such as wood. There is a tendency to square off some single-animal outline studies in related styles, especially of tigers with heads of prey [228], which appear in some variety of styles distinguished by body-patterning also, from something close to 'ours' to the nearly wholly Chinese. We have already encountered one whole solid Type (15a, b [69, 70]) which has no border yet is clearly of the same series, and we shall meet another (the Bear/Wolf plaques). In some ways Types 26-28 seem the point at which the old tradition of outline animal plaques, yet to be considered, meets the bordered examples. The subject of Type 26 [134, 135] is a reclining camel, with a man peering over its back, his arms around its humps, preparing to mount. We shall meet him again, with an ox (Type 42), but he is a rare visitor to the series. Type 27 [136-139] derives from Type 15.55 I have included some examples [140, 141] with creatures other than the long-nosed predator, since they present the same effect of squaring off a creature: thus, a twisted stag [140], done with more feeling for relief but with the Kerbschnitt pattern still on the body, though only lightly incised, and the familiar bird-head antlers. This seems a prototype for the prey on the Bear/Wolf plaques. The very popular squared-up kneeling oxen (Type 28 [142-147]) are sophisticated openwork versions of the common standing type (Type 41, q.v. also for identity); some are beginning to lose the Kerbschnitt patterning, replaced by swirling lines or just stippling. There is a jade version [231]. 55

The part border seems favoured in the north; cf. Sackler no. 244.

42

In the main series, fighting groups of animals are now exceptional and mainly derived from the solid series. Thus, Type 29 [148] is simply an openwork version of Type 9, and Type 31 [149] of Type 11, the attacker 'straightened' and the single rope border helped out by spiral incisions. Type 30 [149] is unusual in rendering the animal bodies in the same 'rope' pattern as the border but the composition is the familiar one. Type 32 [151, 152] is unusual in all but style. The prey has an eared beaked head and feline body, like a Greek griffin, but no wings. Its attacker is the usual horned predator, head only but with what may be its shoulder behind the prey's ear, and two very slim legs placed against the left border, where there is also a vertical attached loop. Pairs of animals are more common, the noblest being the camels at a tree (Type 33 [153155]) which we have met already, solid as well as part of the landscape (Types 24, 25). The Kerbschnitt body patterns have given place now to smoother forms, but the figures are still flat, with fine bunches of hair and modest openwork. There is some variety in borders now and we can detect some imitations, ancient or otherwise (Type 33a-c and see on [221225]). The two twisted ‘horses’ (Type 34 [156-158]) repeat a most popular theme of the solid series (Type 18) but are far more meagre creatures. Those of Type 35 [159-162] are novel; they have horns but long ears and tails (with bird-heads), but some seem to have predator legs. Otherwise the rather debased versions can look more like gazelles, which may be how the motif started. They are closer to the subjects of other series of openwork plaques with bar borders (next chapter). The two winged horses (Type 36 [163*-165]) are unique for the series, also in their natural stance. Their bodies are stylized in the later manner, with the old double rope border and the row of eared bird-heads along the top attached to the ‘tail’; one of those listed is a solid version, and these cannot be very late in the series. Plaques with single creatures include varieties familiar in the solid series but in the new style. Many are relatively small compared with those we have already considered. There is a recumbent stag with an oddly patterned body (Type 37 [166]), camels (Types 38, 39 [167, 168]); a twisted stag with bird heads on the antlers (Type 40 [169]). The standing, sometimes kneeling ox with its head frontal (Type 41 [170-178]) is particularly common. 'Ox' may not be strictly accurate for all, and degrees of hairiness suggest a yak for some. The cloven hoof can sometimes be rendered almost like a double hoof. There is a spirited variant where the creature is grappled by a cowboy wearing the faintly pained or puzzled expression of many manikins in Han art (Type 42 [180-182]). Type 43 [183] offers an unusual pair of heads alone. The majority of these squarish single-figure plaques have a side loop attached to the true left hand one of each pair, rather than a hole for the hook. The textile backs are still recorded.

43

In a more wholly Chinese tradition iconographically, apparent on other openwork plaque series, are those on which a dragon is presented in a figure-of-eight pose (Type 44 [184]), also as a pair (Type 45 [185, 186]) recalling Type 35, and sometimes accompanied by two tortoises (Type 46 [187-190]). The dragon and tortoise are, of course, potent Chinese symbols (like the phoenix, which seems ignored in our series). The dragons have feline (Type 44) or usually vulpine heads with long ears and turned up nose (Type 45), four feline legs and leaf-like excrescences from the body - a canonic type for China in a period when the classical dragon is still in its way experimental iconographically, and well on the way to being wholly reptilian with splaying legs, as in any view of a reptile (like a lizard) seen from above, and with further exaggeration of features like horn and beard. I see no reason not to call these creatures dragons. The tortoises turn their heads, one down, one up. The composition recalls the Chinese one of the male-snake impregnating the female-tortoise. Kerbschnitt has been at last forgotten yet the overall style of the series is retained. Type 45 is a little odd and 45A appears to be from a late, Xianbei context, along with one of the late ‘punched’ plaques (Chapter III). The ribbon-like construction is unusual but the border is of the regular type which seems not otherwise to have survived in this form.

Type Catalogue (openwork series) Types 26-28 have no borders but the animals are roughly rectangular in outline and most are Kerbschnitt-patterned. They may have been set in a border of other material. Type 26.

A camel with a man.

26A. [134] Tokyo National Museum. Silver. Pair. 9.3x5.4. Tokyo 1997, no. 209. 26B. [135] Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 837. Gilt. (T) 8.7x5.1. Traders no. 61. 26C. Jerusalem, BLM no. 164. Gilt. 8.7x5.1. Type 27.

A long-nosed monster. Borderless versions of Type 15.

27A. [136] New York, Calon da Coll. Gilt. Pair. Traders 150, fig. 71.1. 27B. [137] Bonhams, London, 22 April 1999, no. 414. Pair. 5.5x4.1. Mainly solid.

44

There are also versions which lack the heavy body patterning completely, but it is sketched rather as on the bodies of some of Type 28. To these may be related an example with a twisted stag (27d), and a fine stag attacked by a wolf (27e). These seem dependent on the main series though not from the same workshops. 27a. [138] Bonhams, London, 26 October 2007, no. 422. Gilt. 7x4. 27b. [139] From Shuoxian (Shanxi; 'Qin/Han’ tombs). Pair. 7.5x4.5. Wenwu 1987.6, 12, fig. 32. Eared bird-head on crest (not a floral; cf. the forgery, Sackler no. F25), and on the tail (between the legs). Cf. Loo pl. 14.1. 27c. Hong Kong. Rawson/Bunker, no. 219. (T). Gilt. 7/7.3x4.1. Cf Kaogu 1990.5, 413, fig. 4 (Guyuan) – maned, with side loop; Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 99. 27d. [140] New York, MM 1928(18.43.8). Twisted stag. Gilt silver. 12.7x5.1. Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 25.2; Bunker 1970, no. 108; Thaw no. 96. 27e. [141] Berlin, Ostasiat. Mus.; Berlin 2007, no. 49. A kneeling stag with careful body markings, attacked by a wolf. Gilt. Pair. 10.6x6.4; 10.4x6.1. Type 28.

A kneeling 'ox'.

28A. Stockholm MFEA, from Shouzhou. Gilt. Pair (T) Length 9. Karlbeck 1955, pl. 32.12. Discussed in Traders, p. 140. 28B. From Suide Xian (N. Shaanxi) 'W. Han tomb'. Similar to 28A. Discussed in Traders, p. 140. 28C. [142] From Subao, Xiji (Ningxia) 1976. Gilt/silvered. 10.5x4.5. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 102. 28D. [143] New York, Lally. Thaw no. 65. Gilt. Pair 8.9x5.4. 28E. New York, Harris Coll; once Schimmel Coll. Gilt. (T) 9.4x5.5. Traders no. 59b. 28F. Cordes sur Ciel market, AfricAsia 2004. Pair. Gilt. 90x55. 28G. [144] Tenri University Museum. Gilt. 9.9x5.6. Tokyo 1997, no. 224. 28H. Sotheby's, New York, 17 Dec 1996, no. 177; Christies, New York, 8 June 2001, no. 328. Gilt.

45

28I. [145] Sotheby's, New York, 6 June 2006, no. 138a. Pair. Gilt. 8.9x6. Once Israel market. The following have plain bodies, with moderate or no Kerbschnitt-patterning; they seem generally larger: 28J. [146] New York, Levy/White Coll. Gilt. 10x5.5. David-Weill no. 26; Glories no. 49. Gilt. 10x5.5. 28K. From Shijiazhuang (Hebei). (T). Described in Traders, p. 140. 28L. [147] New York, Harris Coll. Gilt. (T) 12.3x7.1. Traders no. 59a. The head is lifted. 28M. Christies, New York, 8 June 2001, no. 328. Gilt. 8.9x5.1. 28N. Barakat (London). 15.2x8.3. 28O. Jerusalem, BLM no. 237. Pair. 10/9.8x6.3/6.2). Plain border. Types 29-46 have the usual rope borders. Type 29.

A twisted tiger lifts a twisted horse; mirrored. See Type 9.

29A. [148] Heydt no. 15. Gilt. 9.8x6.7. Loo pl. 22.4; Dittrich 1963, no. 61 (fig.); Kaogu 1983.1, pl. 4.5. Type 30.

Two twisted tiger-dragons in florals, their bodies rendered in 'rope' pattern.

30A. [149] Paris, Cernuschi Museum 6605 (formerly Wannieck Coll.). 10x4.5. Type 31.

A tiger attacks a twisted ram. Single, spiralized border.

31A. [150] New York, MM. Thaw no. 73. Pair. Gilt. 9.8x4.8.

46

Type 32.

A horned predator attacks a 'griffin'. Vertical loop attached.

32A. [151] London, BM 1950.11-16.12. 6.1x3.8. Dittrich 1963, no. 2 (fig.). 32B. [152] Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 839. 6.2x3.7. Type 33.

Two camels at a tree.

33A. From Xichagou. Wenwu 1960.8/9, 33, fig. 3. 33B. [153] Eskenazi London. Gilt. Pair. (T) 10.2x4.8. Thaw no. 79. 33C. New York, Levy/White Coll. 569. (T) 10.8x5.1. 33D. [154] Shigaraki, Miho Museum. Pair. Gilt. 10.9x5.3. Eskenazi 1993, 17; Miho Museum. West Wing (1997) no. 112. 33E. [155] Janssens 2007, no. 35. Gilt. 11.1x5.4. 33F. Tokyo National Museum. Tokyo 1997, no. 221. Pair, lengths 9.9, 9.8. 33G. Victoria Art Gallery. Till 2009, no. 60. Gilt. 10.9x5.3. 33H. Jerusalem, BLM no. 117. Pair. Gilt. 9.4x4.7. 33I. Jerusalem, BLM no. 178. 10.6x4.9. Plain border. The following degenerate versions of the subject, stylistically different, are ancient copies: 33a. From Daodunzi, tomb 22. Fr. 6x4.8. Plain border. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.3. 33b. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 890. 10.1x5. 33c. From Xichagou. Wenwu 1960.8, 25-25, pl. 3. 33d. Bonhams, London, 5 July 1994, no. 295. 10x5. The type is often shown also in related style on other plaque series with borders of drop pattern [415, 416].

47

Type 34.

Two twisted horses. See Type 18.

34A. [156] Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 118. 34B. [157] Rawson/Bunker, no. 226. 9.5x4.9. Single rope border. 34C. From near Daodunzi (cited ibid.). 34D. [158] Stockholm MFEA K 10149, from Hallong-Osso (south Mongolia). Dittrich 1963, no. 70 (fig.). Summary imitation with a broad border outside the double rope. Type 35. (?).

Two monsters/gazelles, back to back with linked bird-head tails, hairy legs

35A. [159] From Daodunzi, tomb 19. 7.6x3.8. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.2, pl. 17.1. 35B. From Kulai (W. Siberia). Sackler 95, fig. A147. More like gazelles but composed as the others. 35C. [160] Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 209. Single rope border. 35D. [161] Sackler no. 230 (72.2.446-7). Pair. 9.5x5.1. Single rope border. 35E. Huhehot Museum. Cited ibid. 35F. Once Mayer Coll. Copper. Cited ibid. 35G. Los Angeles: Heerameneck no. 893. 7.7x4. Single rope border. 35H. [162] Stockholm MFEA K 11258-001. Related, compressed version. Type 36.

Two winged horses with a row of eared bird-heads above. A is solid.

36A. [163*] London, BM, Loan. (T) 10.2x4.8. Rawson/Bunker, no. 224. 36B. [164, 165] Stockholm MFEA K 11090, 11346. Cut into two. Type 37

A recumbent stag.

48

37A. [166] New York, Lally. Gilt. Pair. (T) 10x4.8. Thaw no. 77. There seem to be dappled body markings. Type 38

A recumbent camel.

38A. [167] New York, MM 1918 (18.43.2). Clay model. 10.2x7.6 (including edging). Traders no. 62; Thaw no. 112. A feisty beast, roaring. Ancient? Type 39

A camel, crouching.

39A. [168] New York, Ariadne. Gilt. 8.9x5.7. Thaw no. 111. A frontal ox head before the neck. Plain body. Type 40

A twisted stag with bird heads on an antler.

40A. [169] Heydt no. 16. 7.4x5.2; Loo pl. 26.4; Devlet, 8, fig. 3.2. Type 41

An 'ox'. Rope border, with a side loop on the right-hand plaque.

With the head frontal, standing: 41A. [170] From Daodunzi. Ningxia Museum. 5.5x3.7. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 113. 41B. Tian and Guo 1986, pl. 58.6-7. 41C. [171] New York, MM. Gilt. Pair. 5.4/7x4.1. Thaw no. 66. Loop. 41D. [172] Stockholm, MFEA K 11033. BMFEA 4 (1932) pl. 24.5. 41E. David-Weill no. 24. Gilt. Pair. 5.4/8x3.9. Jettmar, pl. 25.1. 41F. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 838. Gilt. 6x4.2. 41G. Tokyo market 2005. Gilt. 5.5x4.

49

41H. [173] Pair. (T) 6.5x . Rawson/Bunker, no. 220, citing others from Shijiazhuang (Hebei) and from near Xian. 41J. Sackler no. 218. Once Mayer Coll. Pair. 5.6x3.9: 6.0x4.0. Cf. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 113. 41K. Sackler no.219a. Gilt. (T) 5.7x3.8. 219a. 41L. [174] Sackler no. 219b.] (72.2.441) Once Hoops Coll. Gilt. (T). 5.9x3.4. 41M. Paris, Cernuschi Museum 11831. 41N. Amsterdam market, Pranger 2004. Pair. 6x4.5 41O. Market Artworld 11219, 2004. Gilt. Pair. 5x3.6 41P. [175] Bonhams, London, 26 October 2007, no. 421a, b. Gilt. Pair. 6x4. The body is stippled. 41Q. Taiyo Ltd., 2005. 41R. Victoria Art Gallery. Till 2009, no. 62. Pair. 6.1x4.1, 41S. Jerusalem, BLM no. 156. 5.8x4. Kneeling with the head frontal, plain bodies: 41T. From Chengdu, Sichuan. Kaogu yu wenwu 1983.2, 27, figs. 2.6, 3.1. Plain border. 41U. [176] Kurokawa Institute. Gilt. 5.8x4.3. Tokyo 1997, no. 225. Broad border, no loop. 41V. [177] Heydt no. 19. Gilt. Pair. 6x5.8. Broad border, the centre part scalloped rather than hatched. 41W. [178] Sotheby's, New York, 6 June 2006, no. 138b. Gilt. Pair. 9.2x5.9. Once London market. Shaggy back. Hole in right-hand plaque, not loop. 41X. Bonhams, London, 22 April 1999, no. 415. Pair. 4.3x3.3. Loop. 41Y. In ArtAncient. Shaggy back.

50

Standing, with the head turned down and out with rams' (?) horns, and undecorated body: 41Z. [179] Howard S. Rose, Arte Primitivo 2004, ex London market, ex New York, private. Pair. 4.5x3.2. The head turned right back; the body is plain and perhaps a ram is intended. Type 42

A bucking ox with a man trying to tether it. With side loop. Plain bodies.

42A. [180, 181] New York, Levy/White Coll. 618. Pair. Gilt 5.5x4. Traders no. 6. 42B. Paris, Cernuschi Museum 7795. 5.5x3.5. 42C. [182] Janssens 2007, no. 34. Pair. Gilt 5.8/5.5x4. As 42A. 42D. Art of the Ancient World (Royal-Athena Gallery) 19 (2008) no. 216 (ex French Collection). Pair. Gilt 4.7x3.5. 42E. Jerusalem, BLM no. 169. Gilt. Pair. 4.9/6x3.4. Type 43

Two heads of horned predators with open mouths. With side loop.

43A. [183] Sackler no. 220. Once Hoops Coll. 6.9x3.2. Type 44

A dragon. With side loop. Solid.

44A. [184] New York, Throckmorton. Gilt. 9.2x5.4. Thaw no. 107. Feline head seen from above, feline legs, leaf-like excrescence (wing?) at mid-body. Han style. The type appears also on an openwork plaque with knobbed border (Market, AfricAsia) Type 45

Two dragons.

45A. [185] From Erlanhugou. Sackler 302, fig. W7; Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 202. 45B. [186] Tokyo 1997, no. 228. Pair. 8x4.1.

51

Cf. the longer, Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 856, citing another from the Ordos region. 4.9x1.8. Type 46

A dragon and two tortoises

46A. [187] From Daodunzi, tomb 14. Pair. 9x5. Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, 344, fig. 9.9, pl. 14.1; 83, fig. A123; Wenwu 1996.2, 56, fig. 2.2; Sackler 83, fig. A123. 46B. [188, 189] From Guangzhou, tomb (73) of the King of Nanyue. Gilt. (T) Pair. 8.1x4.3. Wenwu 1996.2, 56, fig. 2.1; Sackler 94, fig. A145; Beijing 1991, figs. 104.1, 150, pl. 96.1; Prüch 1998, no. 59. 46C. [190 ] New York, Calon da Collection. Gilt. Pair. 8.9x4.4. Traders no. 80; Thaw no. 102; Tokyo 1997, no. 222.

52

The Bear/Wolf Plaques There is one subject in this distinctive style which has as much individuality of character as the early Rope-border examples with horses being attacked, but which is certainly somewhat later in date. It involves a beaked and antlered stag-like quadruped being attacked by what looks more like a wolf than anything, and a bear. A major difference is that the plaques have no border at all, but several have the textile back. Most are gilt but one pair seems plain bronze (B/W 5), and two pairs in one find are all gold (B/W 2). They have two loops behind, and a hole beneath the chin of the victim on right-hand plaques, except for one which was adjusted for use far to the west (B/W 4). They are the most substantial of this series, although not particularly large. There is an excavated pair from Sandiancun (Shaanxi), B/W 1, closer to the Ordos than Yixian, but near the capital Xian and described as from the tomb of a Han antiquarian, surely very early Han. Two solid gold pairs on their silken belts were found in the tomb of a prince who died in 154 BC (B/W 2). Farther off, there is an adjusted example from the Pokrovka (B/W 4) and one said to have been bought in Kashgar (B/W 3), but possibly not a local find. An example in the Mariemont Museum (B/W 8) carries an undeciphered inscription. The style is coherent, and clearly derives from that of the Rope-border ‘horse’ plaques but there is more feeling for relief in the animal bodies. The victim's antlers sport an array of eared bird heads. Its body is twisted but the designer has allowed for a long antler to sweep down across the top of the neck and on across the twisted body so that a short row of bird-heads can be accommodated beneath the creature too; he is thus as ingenious as the designer of the early horse plaques in applying a form of logic to the extremely complex composition, creating a balanced pattern at the expense of some anatomical truth. The hoofs seem cloven. The bear has its elbows up, clasping each hind leg of the prey – the one bent towards the wolf and the one, which it is also biting, trailing back. The wolf - presumably a wolf, with long, not round, ears, its mouth distorted in what might be an attempt at a three-quarter view on some examples - bites into the victim's neck but has one paw too on the haunch of the bent leg. The bear's two hind legs are on the ground, but there is another paw before its belly which, it seems, can only be a hindleg of the wolf, staving off its rival from the prey. This may seem an odd contrivance but is the only explanation I can find and it is plausible. This seems the canonic, original type. On a pair in New York (B/W 5) the wolf has been given a more monstrous fanged head and has somewhat lost his identity as a result. The victim has a furrowed but not

53

beaked muzzle, the hoofs are perhaps not cloven, and the bird-heads of its antlers are eared. On these Bunker has also detected a different casting technique, producing a flat back. The most spectacular examples are the two gold pairs (B/W 2) from Shizishan, and a pair in the Miho Museum (B/W 10). The latter carry all the hallmarks of Han jewellery and metalwork to a degree unrivalled on any of the other plaques considered in this paper, with gold- and silver-wire inlay on the exceptionally finely worked bodies, and with the eared birds holding pearls in their beaks in the Chinese manner. Yet this is all clearly still in the tradition of the Sandiancun plaques. In this group the emphasis on the bird-heads may seem to take us closer to the nomad world, but the plaques were surely made in a studio deriving from, if not necessarily the same as, that of the Rope-border plaques. The pair from a tomb of 154 BC (B/W 2) suggests that all are probably early Han in date. Stylistically, B/W 5, 6, 7 and 11 go together for the emphatic frontal treatment of the wolf head, B/W 4 is similar but simplified in some details and poorly preserved, while the others (B/W 3 being of unknown appearance) here attempt something like a three-quarter view. Lengths vary from 10.2 to 15.5. There cannot have been many designers for the group, nor were they working over a long period; but B/W 10 is the contribution of a Han studio working on a model of the main series, its subject subtly re-stated in detail.56 There can be little doubt that some of the fairly numerous relief appliqué discs showing a frontal bear are, on grounds of style, from the same or a related workshop, and they seem to have inspired many derivatives [217, 218].57

List of Bear/Wolf plaques B/W 1. [191, 192] From Sandiancun (Shanxi), a village in the eastern suburbs of Xian, 'a western Han tomb'. Gilt. Pair. 11.2x5. Bunker 1989, 52, fig. 1; Kaogu 1983.2, 24, fig. 1.1, pl. 7.1, 2.

56

There are also some openwork versions where the victim's hindquarters are truncated. These appear to be forgeries: Bunker 1989, 56-58. 57 Sackler nos. 228a, 228b [217] (2x2), both with single rope borders, and no. 228c; derivative, nos. 228d, 229. New York, Thaw nos. 18-20. Janssens 2007, nos. 51, 52 [218]] (2.3x2.6). And many others. They relate to the more obviously Kerbschnitt discs listed above. Also the small whole frontal bears as harness ornament, as Sackler no. 189; Traders no. 55, and cf. no. 60, bridle ornament with a bear attacking a beaked horse.

54

B/W 2. [193-195] From Shizishan (Xuzhou, Jiangsu), a side chamber to the tomb of Prince Liu Wu (died 154 BC). Two pairs, gold, mounted on two silk belts. 13.3x6 (one pair is 0.3 thick, the other 0.12, weighing respectively 390g and 280g; the lighter pair had textile backing and was inscribed, the other not). Zou and Wei, Kaogu 1998.8, 18, fig. 23.1; Digest 3.2/3 (1999) 362, fig.; Gold nos. 200, 202-3; cf. comment in Thaw p. 101. B/W 3. St Petersburg. Bought at Kashgar (Xinjiang). Dittrich 1963, no. 64c; said to be similar to B/W 5, 8. Not located. B/W 4. [196-198] From Pokrovka (Kazakhstan), Cemetery 2, kurgan 17. 13x6. L.T. Yablonsky, Kurgany levoberezhnogo Ileka 2 (1994) fig. 81.13; J.F. Vedder in The Silk Road 2.2 (2004) 21, fig. 10; cf. Bunker in Thaw p. 101. The plaque had been adjusted for local use with two long slots, two corner holes and two loops set through from the front of the plaque (one in the under-chin position but this in a left hand plaque). I am indebted to James Vedder for a photograph [197]. B/W 5. [199-202] New York, MM 18.43.10. Plain bronze. Pair. 14.4x7.5. Dittrich 1963, no. 64a?; Borovka, pl. 70B; Rostovtseff, Iran pl. 31.2; Bunker 1970, no. 113; Bunker 1989, 58, figs. 9, 10 (backs); Thaw no. 75. B/W 6. [203, 204] Once Gerena Fine Art, New York. Gilt. Pair (T). 11.7x5.7. Thaw no. 68. B/W 7. [205-208] Harris Collection. Gilt. Pair. 12.1x6.1 and 11.9x5.7 (T). Traders no. 64. Bunker suggests they are perhaps not a pair for the size discrepancy, but the models were by the same hand. B/W 8. [209, 210] Mariemont, Musée Waroqué. Once Stoclet Collection. Pair. 14.5x6.7. Dittrich 1963, no. 64b; Borovka, pl. 70A; Bunker 1970, 107, fig. 16; Bunker 1989, 55, figs. 4, 5 (inscription on edge, not deciphered). B/W 9. [211*] Shigaraki, Miho Museum. Miho Museum: South Wing 1997 no. 111 (Bunker). Gilt. (T). 13.2x6. Watson 75, fig. 13 (not Metropolitan Museum). B/W 10. [212, 213] Shigaraki, Miho Museum. Miho Museum: South Wing 1997 no. 110 (Bunker). Pair. 14.5x6.6. Gold and silver inlaid wire indicates hair over all animal bodies and accentuates details of the bolder body markings. The birds' beaks hold pearls. B/W 11. Victoria Art Gallery. Till 2009, no. 65. Pair. Gilt. 11.5x5.4. B/W 12. Jerusalem, BLM no. 166. Gilt. 11.3x5.3. Most like B/W 4, 5.

55

B/W 13. [214, 215] Jerusalem, BLM no. 226. Gilt. Pair. 10.2x5. Similar to the last but the bear’s ears are pointed. B/W 14. [216] Jerusalem, BLM no. 101. Gilt. 15.5x7.6. Openwork, and with some odd stylistic features. Ancient?

56

EPILOGUE No classification of such material made over such a time span can be neat or complete, and here and there in the lists there has been call to include plaques which seem to derive from the main series but do not altogether belong to them, yet are clearly not related to other plaque series yet to be considered. Many might be added and the potentially relevant material is legion. Thus, [219] offers, 58 in a rope border, a splayed tiger very much in the tradition of the main series but threatening prey more in the manner we shall meet in the next chapter, spread over the body of a prostrate ‘horse’. [220] has its border reduced to a row of pellets (compare [73]) and the two stags on it are more supple versions of pairs which we shall also meet in the next chapter; but on a stand between them is a Chinese dancing bear, such as never appears in the commoner series, but is a familiar of Han art.59 Sometimes a common subject, such as the camels, are presented, in a rather jejune manner, within a different but still substantial border: linear [221], or of Ss [223, 224], or a herringbone [225].60 The same herringbone appears for a plaque with two fighting groups, in the familiar composition and poses, but rendered in more fluent, Chinese style [226, 227].61 Many simple flat plaques in a poor style showing predators with heads of prey carry the Kerbschnitt and so may be taken to derive from the main series, and they are roughly squared off [228], but clearly imitative, and not like any of the ‘nomad’ plaques of the next chapter.62 We should not be surprised that the distinctive Rope-border groups and figures were copied in other media, or that there are other points of contact with what seems work in a more traditional Chinese manner. A particular point of interest is the relationship of the style and subjects to work in jade (jadeite) and other stone. Generally speaking, the figures in jade, in the round and in relief, are far more sophisticated, if less anatomically accurate, in their treatment of body forms and detail: more fluid and imaginative, and they derive from a 58

Market (Joyce Gallery) (length 5.9). London, BM 1950.11-16.4 (8.4x5.7). 60 [221, 222] Sackler no. 233, with wood backing (10.2x5). [223] ibid. no.240 (10.4x6.1). [224] Duan Shu’an 1955, no. 115. [225] ibid., no. 116. 61 Cologne; Dittrich 1963, no. 69; gilt (10.9x8.1). 62 [228] London, British Museum 1973.7-26.90. There are many others, several being smaller. Dittrich 1963, no. 109. Seattle; Bunker 1970, no. 120. New York 1985.214.80 (ex Erickson). Ars Asiatica 7 (1925) no. 86. Christies, London, 20 April 2005, no. 210; ibid., 6 November 2009, no.8.4. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 88. Sackler no. 156. Thaw no. 9. Los Angeles; Heeramaneck no. 847. Jerusalem, BLM nos.11, 12. 59

57

longer tradition. There is nothing to suggest that the subjects for jades were themselves a major source of inspiration for the bronzes, although jade was often cut in plaques, and there are naturally points of contact, while one or two of the bronze motifs seem to copy jade styles rather than the more mannered style of most bronzes; thus for the dragon, our Type 44 [184], while the skimpy dragons of Type 45 [185, 186] are more like work to be considered in the next chapter. Straight copying in jade from the bronzes is rare. There is a careful copy of Type 28 [229]63 (see [142-146]) set in a gilt bronze frame, of a type we see also for a plaque with a dragon of the pure Han type for jades [230], 64 just to point the contrast in styles. The subject is also found unframed [231], and accompanied by a jade tiger [232], 65 with the usual Kerbschnitt, but in a fine style which is not exactly that of either the bronzes or of other jades. Empty frames are known, probably for such stone inlays [233], and see our [387, 388]. Rearing felines on a solid plaque [234]66 recall bronze compositions, but the animal type is rather different and the bodies do not fill the field. A gilt bronze version showing a familiar creature is flat, with scored background, making it look like stone [235].67 We may anticipate the plaque series yet to be considered, in the interests of keeping discussion of the stone parallels together. Here we are dealing with imitation of bronze types surely made outside China. Thus, there is a close copy of [389-392] in nephrite [236];68 a solid steatite version [237]69 of the bird and feline fighting, like [357]. A remarkable pair (mirrored) of solid plaques with two tigers attacking a boar rendered in a fairly realistic style [238]70 might be relatively early (compare [310*]). In general we may be sure that the jade parallels are all of Western Han date; and there is nothing in stone really resembling the early Rope-border Types 1-7, yet these were surely made in north China. Otherwise, given the probable Chinese origin of the Rope-border plaques, it is not surprising to find the motif of the opposed eagle heads in various forms, and there is an example of a quartered jade plaque with mirrored animal subjects [239]71 recalling the quartered compositions of Types 13, 14, though nothing more. For the relationship of compositions like [240] with Type 22, see above. The non-appearance of the Rope-border plaques in the Altai or Peter’s Treasure has been remarked. Some features are common to both, however, apart from the motif of the twisted 63

Rawson 1995, 311, fig. 23.3 (7.2x4.5). Jade Wares of Guanglang in the Han Dynasty no. 97. 65 Enduring Art of Jade Age China II. Throckmorton Fine Art, New York (2002) no. 40 (10.8x5.7; 12x6). 66 Gu Fang, The Complete Collection of Jades unearthed in China (2005) I, no. 163. 67 Heydt no. 18 (20.7x11.2). Ancient? 68 New York, Thaw no. 106. Rawson, Jade no. 23.1 (16.4x7.3). 69 London, BM 1950.11-16.1; Rawson 1995, 311, fig. 1 (height 7.9). 70 100 Jades from the Lautien Shanfang Collection (1995) pl. 87 (8.5x4.5). 71 Gu Fang, op.cit. (n.66), I, no. 176. 64

58

bodies, notably the eared bird-heads, more apparent in the Altai on a variety of other objects, including tattoos, rather than metalwork, as we have seen already. A more remarkable echo of subjects and style appears much farther west, at Filippovka in the Urals. Here the rich goldwork is hammered not cast, but many motifs are more familiar in the Rope-border series than elsewhere. The Kerbschnitt pattern itself is prominent, though hammered [241], the pairs of twisted horses (stags) appear [242, 243] (resembling Type 18), and small plaques with the creatures adjusted to a square [244, 245] (as Type 28).72 These are judged fourth-century BC in date; perhaps too early, however. There is also much there to relate to the most familiar of the Sarmatian series of metalwork, notably where stone inlays appear – a feature conspicuously absent from the Rope-border plaques, which again distances them from much that is current in Eurasia, and which we shall find more often in the plaque series yet to be considered. It is as well to recall that there is more and earlier of the twisted-animal and other related subjects in the hammered-metal Animal Style of the west, than in the cast-metal, which we are dealing with, in the east. But, clearly, influence and motifs travelled both ways, and the Rope-border series is largely remarkable for its significant dependence also on some aspects of non-steppe, Chinese arts.

72

These are best studied in Aruz (ed.) 2000, nos. 2 [241] (height 50), 27 [242] (8.1x5.7); 30 [244] (4.2x3.6), 98 [245] (5.2x4.1). On other eastern influence in Scythia, N.A. Bokovenko in ACSS 3.1 (1996) 97-122.

59

60

CHAPTER III OTHER PLAQUE SERIES

The Treasure of Peter the Great

The gold plaques and jewellery in Peter the Great’s Treasure, now splendidly displayed at the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, play an important role in this story, but require some explanation since this is not simply a source of rich examples of plaques which are related, in one way or another, to the finds made farther to the east. The golden Treasure was assembled and sent to St Petersburg between 1716 and 1727. It represents the best of the tomb-digging of over a decade, but there can be no doubt that the majority of the finds must have been of less valuable material, would have been far more numerous, and could not survive the probable melting down for their metal content. So we are denied knowledge of the appearance of the majority of such early finds in this area – southern Siberia, in the Minussinsk Basin and to the west, Tomsk being the main centre for their dispatch to Peter. A good corrective is the account of some of the pieces in the Minussinsk Museum (see Gazette) which represent more of the common and familiar stock in bronze. We cannot therefore judge how many were just like those from farther east, which comprise the bulk of those studied here. The overall resemblance of the gold to their cheaper cousins in the east might encourage one to think that they are simply the best of a series of common styles which were in vogue throughout Eurasia to the borders of, and possibly within, north China. But this is not an assumption to adopt too readily, given that there are so few exact matches and that most seem later than the earliest of the series here distinguished. That they have nothing to do with our Rope-border series is an indication both of their later date than the most distinctive and earliest of these, and especially of the more wholly Chinese associations of that developing series. They do however indicate that

61

the area was an important and rich one for nomad power, with perhaps Xiongnu and other centres of government and wealth. In this chapter pieces from the Treasure have a role in demonstrating luxury versions of some of the commoner types and shapes, but they must all be judged later than those early gold plaques in various styles from Aluchaideng and Xigoupan, which are also discussed below, and are found in the east only. For one thing, many in Peter’s Treasure carry inlays of turquoise or other material which is more characteristic of Han times, and of the later Sarmatian, than of any earlier. Indeed, it may be queried whether all the material deserves inclusion here, but many pieces are manifestly related to the more ordinary finds elsewhere, while others do not seen uneasy companions to some of simpler composition and workmanship, and at any rate stylistic frontiers in Eurasia were very fluid. The gold is rather mesmerising. I have remarked (see on n.35) that it has been observed, from apparent signs of ‘corrosion’ on some pieces, that many might be in fact gold casts of bronze originals, making them a more suitable gift for a Tsar. If so, this would explain much. Pieces from the Treasure are repeatedly illustrated. A nearly full publication by Rudenko in 1962 is a major source but the quality of its illustrations is poor. They are splendidly displayed in St Petersburg. Jettmar (1967; especially chapter 13) gives an excellent overall account of these finds west of China; and see a discussion in Bunker 1992a.

Introduction The rest of this chapter is devoted to a discussion of other plaque series, both 'Ordos' and from farther off in Central Asia, notably from Peter the Great’s Treasure. There are outlineanimal plaques, the earliest of which are very Chinese in style and give rise to rich and varied later series of outline animals. Many seem to be belt-plaques and some are obviously so. I ignore here the many earlier ‘outline’ animal plaques of ‘Ordos’ type, of various shapes and uses. They are seldom of predators rather than prey and they match many similar small bronzes in the round. They too deserve a Corpus. There are various very early ‘garment plaques’, small, and with the subjects set vertically or horizontally, which are commonly assigned to the sixth century BC or earlier, and come mainly from the very north of China or beyond. The subjects are repeated animals, singles or paired in groups of ‘boxes’, and less commonly predator and prey, done in openwork, and it is reasonable to assume that the inspiration for them is mainly nomadic although not necessarily not Chinese. These seem to anticipate the series discussed here, and their functions were presumably different, probably not for belts, but they seem to be an

62

intimation of what is to come [246-250].73 These are not exclusively nomadic in use, so far as we can judge, but belong generally to the north China area. It would be wrong to assume that all the plaque types yet to be described are belt-plaques, rather than attachments to other forms of dress, cloaks or jackets, even harness, where the fastening may be arranged by linking two mirror-imaged items. Versions were certainly made for attachment to daggers. Nor are they necessarily all for male use although the subjects do not admit anything particularly feminine, being confined to the animal and monster kingdom, some hunting and a few male warriors or herdsmen. Some early finds in the north at Aluchaideng and Xigoupan give a glimpse of what must have been prolific forerunners of the later, better attested series, including the Ropeborders. They are puzzling but may offer important clues to later developments. Later, several rather grand gold plaques in Peter the Great's Treasure represent elaborate versions, possibly made near their findplaces in Siberia, but echoed in plainer bronze or gilt versions to the east. It may be repeated that the Treasure has virtually nothing to offer in understanding of the Rope-border series, another indication that the latter has as much or more to do with China and its immediate neighbours than with anything in the steppes and farther west. Other plaques considered below, mainly rectangular, are, except for some iconography, also distinct from the Rope-border series in style and sometimes in form (e.g., those with irregular top edges; the BP plaques), and, surely, in source and area of use, although they may be found together, as in the Daodunzi cemetery. The plaques considered now are numerous and are not described here in any great detail or with exhaustive bibliography, like the Rope-borders which seemed to deserve such treatment. They do, however, merit such consideration by scholars better conversant with the originals and with the evidence for their sources, not that so many have any more reliable and informative excavated sources than the Rope-borders. It has seemed useful, however, to present some survey and illustration of the available evidence and draw any obvious conclusions and parallels. It would be too easy for such a study to wander into other, however closely related, problems of finds and iconography, across the whole of Eurasia. Indeed, a comprehensive and detailed study of the arts of Eurasia, their interfaces and interrelationships, would be a challenging task; what follows is merely a modest contribution in one area.

73

E.g., New York, Thaw no. 139, and references (Hebei). Tokyo 1997, nos. 151, 164-6. Janssens 2007, no. 57 [246] (5x2.9). Sackler nos. 84, 130 [247](5.1x3.2) predator and prey; with further references: Hebei, 132 [248] (4.5x3.2), 133 [249] (5.1x2.2), 134 [250] (4.2x2.1). Janssens 2007, nos. 63-4. Berlin 2007, no. 6.

63

The outline plaques These are the farthest removed from the Rope-border plaques in appearance although we shall find stylistic details which recall them. They have no frames but are defined by the outline of the animal involved, normally a tigerish predator with small prey. Unlike the mainly later Rope-border predators, they are distinctive for their long, slim, naturalistic forms, overlaid by some variety of pattern. The general type is commonplace throughout the early period for small animal plaque attachments in various styles. I concentrate here only on groups which, for their ornament and style, may have something to teach us about their debt to Chinese arts and their relationship to the rest of the series studied in this monograph. Most come from northerly sites, some certainly occupied by nomads (the Hu people – in this case the Xiongnu), and the Chinese character of much of the work might qualify them as gifts from Chinese rulers. If so, many of the earliest observe Chinese practice and iconography more closely than, for instance, the finds of Aluchaideng and Xigoupan, to be considered next, and it is difficult to believe that the earliest are not of Chinese manufacture, and most probably for Chinese use. Most seem to be single plaques rather than pairs, and some have the arc and stud at the side for fastening (with cord or in a hole on a belt; as [258, 268, 269, 275], cf. [267, 273, 277, 289]), possibly an Asian rather than Chinese mode. The earliest have a predator, more feline than vulpine, attacking serpentine creatures. The body is covered with volute and serpentine patterns over a stippled ground, exactly like that seen on Chinese bronze vases assigned to late Zhou period (fourth/third century BC), and earlier. The theme may be that of the steppes but was certainly not foreign to China and we should probably expect these to have been made for Chinese use [251-254]. The body patterning sometimes takes the form of small creatures, mainly serpentine, a mode with a longer history farther west. Overall, body patterns much resemble those on the Chinese bronze vessels.74 The plaques appear both solid and openwork.75 There are examples from south-east Gansu province which seem fourth-century BC in date. 74

Notably on the lu with pei, Chinese Bronzes from the Buckingham Collection (1946) pls. 75-7, where the animals are isolated. 75 New York, Thaw no. 95 [251] (12.1x7). Sackler no. 200 (= Traders no. 54) [252] (12.4x7.2), and p.244, fig. 200 (Oxford, Ashmolean Museum) = Bunker 1970, no. 105, tinned. Dittrich 1963, no. 104 (Stoclet) [253] (11.2x5.5). Kaogu 1988.5, pl. 4, 1-3 and 420-1, figs. [254], from Qingyang (Gansu) – lifting both a fore and hind paw.

64

A related and richer series has an openwork group of a wolf (?) attacking a small deer. The body patterning recalls that of the last discussed, but flatter, geometricised, rendered with simple double spirals, with the legs and neck done in hatched rills. The head is more emphatic and the creature has a crest and long tail, which meet at centre-back and have eared bird-head ends [255-260]. Sources include Guyuan (Ningxia) – south Ordos desert.76 There are interesting variants with or without the back crest+tail, and [260] carries versions of Kerbschnitt. [261] is more ambitious, it has a very geometric patterned body, pointed nose and ear, lowered tail; it is attacking a yak, 77 and has one forepaw oddly withdrawn beneath it belly on or near the yak’s head. One has simple spirals on the body [262].78 The type, without tail and crest, is used also as part of a belt-hook of Chinese type [263].79 Others have bodies with curvilinear patterning including emaciated versions of Kerbschnitt patterns [264-268]; and these take on more realistic tigerish heads.80 [269] is also odd in having a frontal tiger head.81 Many are tinned. The motif is probably derived from the west although the patterning is more Chinese and it is not echoed in the Altai. From these derive many cruder versions, probably still early.82 But there is at least one example, a late fourthcentury plaque from Zhongshan, with the motif of the lifted animal (see below) and rendered in a thoroughly traditional Chinese style and technique (inlaid bronze) [270].83 There are many variants on these predator/prey plaques of which I mention only the most distinctive. [271*] is an oddity, with a Chinese funny face on the shoulder, a stag on the rump.84 Splendid gold plaques from Nianfangqu have the tiger's body patterned with other 76

Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 101 (= Sackler 45, fig. A44) [255], from Guyuan. Sackler no. F20 is judged a forgery. Traders no. 50 (=Rawson/Bunker, no. 207 – 10.2x6.1) [256]. Tokyo 1997, no. 191 [257] (length 9.1). [260] Ortiz no. 217; Bunker 1970, no. 112 (10.2x5.9). New York, Thaw no. 94 [258](11.4x6.4), and no. 63 [259](7.9x5.1), tinned, accompanied by a set of small plaques with a whirl of wings and eared bird-heads, commonly found elsewhere. This also carries a version of Kerbschnitt. For the small plaques cf. Traders nos., 84-6, Tokyo 1997, nos. 169-71, also for the characteristic rows of dots. They recall the pairs of entangled dragons, Sackler no. 199 and fig. 199 (from Guyuan). Crest only and spirals on the body: Bussagli 1969, no. 42 (Lugano, Private), and Traders no. 90 (with a ram). 77 M.Sullivan, The Arts of China (1973) 57, fig. 36 above, Washington, Freer Gallery (length 11.5). 78 Eskenazi 13 June-7 July 1989 (ex Loo, Zannotti) no. 17; Bussagli 1969, no. 42 (length 9). Compare the spirals on bodies on the disc-lid, Tokyo 1997, no. 89 [240], which is related to our series. Similar outline but tail, no crest: Christies, London, 6 November 2009, no. 8.5. 79 Revue des Arts Asiatiques 12 (1938) pl. 33.8 (Coiffard Collection). 80 Traders nos. 51-2, with references (Ningxia, Gansu). Sackler 41, fig. A31, from Guyuan, tinned. Art of the Ancient World (Royal-Athena) 2006, no. 232. David-Weill no. 56. Cahn, Katalog 19 (2007) no. 27, accompanied by family [264]. Janssens 2007, no. 16 [265] (6.9x4.1), also with crest. Ortiz 1996, no. 218, crest and tail (Bunker 1970, no. 112). Duan Shu’an 1995, nos. 98, 97 [266, 267]. Rawson/Bunker, no. 208. Jerusalem, BLM no. 157 (8.8x5.3) [268]. 81 Jerusalem, BLM no. 103 (10.2x5.10). 82 As Sackler nos. 203-4. 83 Rawson 1999, 39, fig. 8b; Shandong state, S. China. From a screen stand (H.21.9) 84 Jerusalem, BLM no. 5 (12.5x6.3), tinned bronze, part gilt.

65

animal (camel?, feline) and bird figures and heads [272*], 85 an overlay device which we have just met and shall meet again, though rarely; it is an Animal Style feature, commoner farther west. Another gold pair are stylistically different - a blaze of inlay [273] rather than body-patterning.86 The predator is attacking the hindquarters of a boar, on its back, its head and forelegs showing below the attacker’s body. The many other plaques of this general type fall less readily into individually clear stylistic groups which might betoken a busy studio. One series shares an important common subject – the predator is holding up the limp body of its prey which hangs on to the ground or, rarely, is lifted on to its shoulders. The motif is one met in Asia, in the Altai (see [8, 9]), and is certainly derived from the west for its realism. The plaques come in various styles – plain [274-276]87, the first with a wing-like bird head at centre back; some with a form of Kerbschnitt patterning [277, 278], which we saw on [259, 260, 264-268];88 and many with various forms of rilling, sometimes in chevrons or confined to the manes [279-281].89 [279] boasts a partial border, hatched. [282] is a naive oddity in that the model for the feline has been tilted to make it appear to be attacking a boar.90 Otherwise, I single out simply a few on which the main decoration on the bodies is rilling, partial or all-over [283-288].91 Some of these are very large, bulky and with the prey curled under the body. The wooden origin of many of these is made clear by some wooden examples found at Berel ([6], compare [283]), 92 and generally by wooden outline animals

85

Sackler 54, fig. A65; Tokyo 1997, no. 194; Gold nos. 133, 135 (L. 13.8). A slightly rougher bronze version shown in the Eleventh Asia Arts Festival in Ordos Museum, 2009. 86 L’Asie des Steppes no. 111 from Yikezhao (15x7.7). 87 Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 100 [274], no. 96 [275]. Gazette 8, fig. 11, with just the head of a ram, from Minussinsk, Moscow Hist. Museum [276]. 88 Traders 133, fig. 52.1, Guyuan [277], no. 52 [278] (8.2x3.5). Rawson/Bunker, fig. 2.1, no. 206. 89 London, BM 1950.11-16.8. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 103 [280]. Sackler 46, fig. A46, Jianhecun, Guyuan near Yanglang [281] (Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 105; height 8); similar, once Stoclet (Ausstellung, Berlin 1929, no. 116). Sackler 61, fig. A83, Guoxianyaozi [279] (Tokyo 1997, no. 195; L. 9.2); 340, F35, as modern. New York, Thaw no. 97 Bunker 1970, no. 123. Berlin, Ostasiat. Mus. 1965-24a, b. Los Angeles : Heeramaneck nos. 827, 828, 878. Copenhagen (Dittrich 1963, no. 93) a goat. Sotheby’s New York, 7 June 2007, no. 89, pair (ex-Weill). Sotheby’s London, 1 April 1974, no. 73. Berlin 2007, no. 46, as [279] without the border. 90 London, BM 1950.11-17.15 (10x5). 91 Bussagli 1969, no. 38, Musée Guimet. L'Asie des Steppes no. 110 [283] (14.5x10). London, BM 1947.712.421 [284] (15x11.6). Paris, Cernuschi Museum [285]=Watson 1995, 73, fig. 132, Jettmar frontispiece (as London, BM). Bunker 1970, no. 84; Nelson-Atkins Museum Handbook (1993) 280 (pair) (Kansas City). New York, Thaw no. 64 [286](11.7x6.4); with two sides straightened as for a border, a device seen elsewhere. More modestly on the forepart only, and in silver: Thaw 29, fig. 41 [287] = Sackler 54, fig. A66, from Shihuiqou (in the Ordos); Tokyo 1997, no. 196 (L. 10.4) Very shallow rilling, as on wood, appears for various single figures of tigers, as Gold nos. 103 [288] (Nalingaotu, Shaanxi), 105, and as on our [20]. 92 See above, note 19.

66

in the Altai [8, 9]. Sometimes the body is plain [289-291], 93 including a few with no prey [292], [289] recalling (or anticipating) Rope-border Type 27 [136, 137], [292] decorated with hatched circles.94 A few feature a wolf reclining, his head turned back [293, 294], 95 and there are versions with two, sharing a body [295] in a somewhat different style.96 Beside these, in a different class but still essentially ‘outline plaques’, there is also the wellknown, fine and abundant series of realistic recumbent horse plaques in silver, rather later, and virtually ‘classical’ [296, 297], real horses, not the steppe Przewalskis, surely Han in date and probably origin, though often placed earlier.97 With these go other fairly realistic studies of horses, and of boars [298].98 Many of these outline plaques have been assigned to the fourth century BC, which seems likely for the earliest and most detailed, but less so for the others which share some features with the advanced Rope-borders. Many, notably those with the rilled bodies, are close to the asymmetrical BP plaques (see below). There is no great stylistic unity except for a few groups which have been picked out. And there are the very many smaller animal plaques for decorative attachment, probably to clothing, but in a class of their own, to be distinguished from the main series of alleged belt or clothing plaques. Apart from the earliest of the outline plaques [251-254], and to a lesser degree their very stylized kin [255-262], the Chinese elements of design and subject are not conspicuous, although some more sophisticated techniques with the metal probably are; but equally, there is not that much to associate them with Central Asian styles, ‘Scythian’, Animal Style, or other, of this date. They lie between the two worlds and we have to judge them probably as common wear for various nomad peoples, which at this date must mean the Xiongnu and probably the Yuezhi, soon to be moved on, but not excluding Chinese pastoralists. This is also the period when this ‘no-man’s land’ between settled and pastoral,

93

Sackler 42, fig. A32 [289], from Yanglang. New York, Thaw no. 93, tinned [290] (11.7x5.7). Traders no. 89 [291] (12.4x6.8). Glories no. 47. Devlet, fig. 4. 1, 4. 94 Traders no. 28 (7x3.5). For the roundels cf. Tokyo 1997, no. 189. 95 Sackler no. 221 [293] (5.4x3.5). London, BM 1950.11-16.7 [294](height 6.3): Bunker 1970, no. 121. Bussagli 1969, no. 39. Rawson/Bunker, no. 218. Museum of East Asian Art. Inaugural Exhibition 2 (McElney, Bath) no. 263.1. Heydt no. 69 (Loo pl. 10.5, and ibid., pl. 10.4 for a pair back to back). In this style, Berlin 2007, nos. 25-6. 96 Janssens 2007, no. 3 [295] (8x4.8), 4. David-Weill nos. 17, 43. Loo pl. 14.3. 97 Bussagli 1969, no. 43: London, BM 1945.10-17.215 [296] (15.2x7.6). Jettmar, pl. 27.1. Tokyo 1997, no. 210 [297] (14.5x8.1) = New York Thaw no. 101. Berlin 2007, no. 1. There are also standing versions, of lesser quality, and some with a man before them, as one from Sibirsk, Sackler 95, fig. A148. 98 New York, gilt (11.4x7). A pair to Ortiz no. 218. Also halves, back to back: Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 834.

67

never very clearly defined, begins to be invaded by Chinese wall-building to serve as bases for defence as much as real boundaries: more on this in our Conclusions.

Aluchaideng, Xigoupan These two northern sites within the bow of the Yellow River were nomad centres, presumably of the Xiongnu. They and others in the vicinity have proved rich in finds of gold and silver, apparently fourth- and certainly third-century in date, and generally considered the result of Chinese benevolence or appeasement, while some have Chinese inscriptions on them stating their weights, including our [310*]. These must have been made in China. The rest, mainly plaques and some personal ornaments, are in a coherent style and with a fairly narrow range of subjects: [299, 300] horses (including twisted), [301, 302] stags, [303] vulpine predators, including two fighting [304], a threesome involving an eagle [305] (anticipating [357-359]), a few eared bird-heads but not as lavish as on later series, and no Kerbschnitt on major figures. It is not clear whether any are beaten, not cast. There is also a silver outline plaque [306] with a predator carrying a deer on its back, a realistic act for a feline, not a wolf.99 A openwork gold plaque in Shanghai [307] with herringbone border perhaps goes here.100 These, with one or two examples with a single twisted border, seem to offer precursors for the subjects in the Rope-border series where the figures are far more intense in their compositions and, at first, more mannered than these mainly fluent forms.101 They are either contemporary with or pointing the way to, or are a parallel phenomenon to, the early Rope-border series. It is perhaps justifiable to see them as a record of precious Chinese gifts, worked in a style and with subjects derived mainly from nomad arts, but not copying them, and which are to have a role in the development of the subject matter of the Rope-border series, though not of its style. Importantly, these are the first expression of the type of bordered, rectangular belt plaque, which will be exemplified by the Rope-borders, and are clearly marked off from the outline plaques and the varied shapes of their successors. They will be further considered in our Conclusions. Other early rectangular plaques, with single predators, are found in Inner Mongolia [1], mounted with small ornaments such as accompany the outline [259] and may help indicate the ancestry of the type. [308-310*] are exceptional pieces which deserve separate consideration. From Aluchaideng a pair of belt-plaques with single-twist borders anticipate the form of the 99

Tian and Guo (eds.) 1986, 356, fig. 4.4; Kaogu 1980.4, 335, fig. 5. Sackler, 51, fig. A58. Treasures from the Shanghai Museum (St Petersburg 2007) no. 89(10.4x6.9); Gems no. 108. Cf. the border of [226]. 101 On the sites see Sackler 47-52; Wenwu 1980.7, 1-7, figs. 3-4 for our [299-305]. 100

68

Rope-border series and something of their iconography. They show four tigers attacking a prostrate yak, but the predator bodies are rilled [308] in a fashion we have met already [283-286].102 However, the alternative and familiar woodwork-derived technique of Kerbschnitt does appear here, and also at this date, in little gold hedgehogs [311].103 Animal-outline plaques and other compositions for ornaments are represented by a series of recumbent gold 'wolves', with big crests of eared bird-heads [309], so familiar among the Rope-borders. This is also an early example of the use of turquoise inlay, not applied in quite the manner of later times.104 There are related figures on headdresses, with other animals [312].105 Much in this goldwork also reminds one of Saka production much farther west, in the Issyk Kurgan (Kazakhstan), 106 and of gold strips from Alagou ([313] near Urumchi, Xinkiang), where there are also roundels [314] probably fourth/third-century.107 The Xigoupan finds include a pair of relatively large gold belt-plaques, again with singletwist borders, and textile backs, relating to the Rope-borders in all but style [310*]108 They are duplicates, not mirrored. They show a twisted tiger attacking a boar in a realistic 'archaic' manner unmatched easily anywhere in the east, even among the realistic Yunnan bronzes, but not unlike work done far to the west for a Greco-Scythian market, on the Black Sea or in eastern Anatolia. Is this where their makers should be sought? If so, they were working in China, since the plaques bear a Chinese inscription on the back recording the weight, and mentioning ‘pig’ and ‘tiger’. The finesse of the mainly realistic detail is remarkable, at odds with almost everything else our plaques display. The stippling on the boars’ bodies seems to have been added after the casting. We have already discussed [238] a pair of jade plaques comparable for subject but somewhat more Chinese in style. It seems likely that the works discussed in this section, however ‘nomad’, were also dependent on Chinese example or some comparable Chinese stimulus, the historical context of which will be explored in our Conclusions. An important observation is that we seem to have located the beginning of the rectangular metal belt plaque form, with the borders and hook-holes, rather than outline animals.

102

Sackler 51, fig. A57, from Aluchaideng [308](length 12.7); Traders 60, fig. 25; Gold no. 102. Sackler 51, fig. A59; et saepe, as Tokyo 1997, no. 199, from Shihuiqou. 104 Sackler 50, fig. A55, from Aluchaideng; Thaw 28, fig. 40. 105 Sackler 49, figs. A53-4; Kessler 1993, 53, fig. 25. 106 K. Akishev, The Ancient Gold of Kazakhstan (Almati, 1983). 107 Arts asiatiques 42 (1987), 34, fig. 1; Gems no. 102; strips also Eshkenazi 11 June-5 July, 1991, no. 59. On Alagou, Sackler 51. 108 Sackler 52, figs. A60-1; Thaw 30, figs. 42-3 (the back); L'Asie des Steppes no. 112; Linduff and Rubinson 2008, 176, fig. 9.1; Gold no. 132. (13x10). 103

69

Buckles, Flanged and Horseshoe plaques, and related pieces The plaques discussed here are very heterogeneous, from the very Chinese to the more obviously nomadic in style, but their styles and subjects are often interrelated and play their part in the history of the better defined groups. A series of buckle plaques, roughly rectangular but becoming ovoid in shape and usually with a rectangular flange to one side and pierced in various ways, have an interesting ancestry. They possibly relate in later years to the brisk production of buckle derivatives, roughly in horseshoe form, and best represented in Siberia to the north (Derestuy). At their head stand a number of rectangular plaques of tinned bronze, gabled at one end with a flange at the other, possibly as early as the fifth/fourth century BC.109 On the best the overall pattern of twisted serpentine bodies resembles, and indeed must be, Chinese of the period, and it appears also on jade plaques of this exact shape, which are possibly the inspiration for them. The bodies are decorated with dot rows, a frontal yak(?) head is seen, as on later plaques, but also a clear taotie head, like the Chinese, attached to a divided body, with smaller predator bodies towards the flange [315-317].110 There are here all the elements of the later series, while they also much recall the early Rope-borders, and have a patterned scale border. The others, openwork and more summary in their animals, whose bodies are patterned rather like early outline plaques, have a plain border [318, 319].111 One [320, 321]112 has flat fighting groups very similar to the more regimented Rope-border [49, 50]. Examples are from Ningxia and Qingyang, and they have been regarded as having been made for non-Chinese people. If so they certainly owe most at first to Chinese arts and later turn to styles more like other plaques considered here. The type had a long life. The plaques of a simple openwork oval with a blunt end are few, with varied stylistic associations.113 One popular type is openwork, with a wolf, its body cut for inlays, and a crest of the familiar eared bird-heads [322].114 Their kin is well represented in the north at 109

On the type, Sackler 241-3. Calon da Calon Coll., Traders no. 53 [315] (7.4x3.9); Tokyo 1997, no. 192. New York, Thaw no. 62. Both tinned. Slightly simplified version from Qingyang, Kaogu 1988.5, 414, fig. 2.11 [316]. And with a blunt end decorated only with curls; Tokyo 1997, no. 193 [317] (L. 7.7). The scheme derives from a purely Chinese type, as Bunker 1970, no. 72, and cf. no. 64. 111 Sackler no. 198 [318] (6.7x3.8) and fig. 198 [319], from Langwozikeng (Ningxia). 112 Kanagawa Institute; Tokyo 1997, no. 223 (L.10). 113 Also known in bone, plain, L'Asie des Steppes no. 136b. 114 Sackler no. 241 and fig. 241 (11.5x8); Tokyo 1997, no. 216. Wenwu 1960.8, 25-35 pl. 5, from Xichagou. 110

70

Derestuy (Buryatia) where the type must have become at home, but it is met also at Xichagou and in the Minussinsk area. A finer version has two horsemen, one with a bird on his wrist, indicating falconry, and a quiver before him, the other with a long straight sword at his side and perhaps a bowcase [323].115 The horses and their equipment are very close to those on the wrestler plaques [381-384], possibly from the same workshop. And the shape and subjects remind one of the later bone plaques from Orlat (north of Samarkand) with their armoured cavalrymen, 116 thought to be saddle decoration and probably nearcontemporary. The commonest type with any sophistication has the oval bordered by the leaves of a tree, within it a facing predator with its paws over the frontal head of a reclining ibex [324].117 On one, without the flange, there is just the gold ibex [326], a plain version of the same with no border [327] and a frontal ox [328].118 [326] is from ‘Bactria’, heavily inlaid and close in general style to some of the Tillya Tepe gold (first century AD), yet its ancestry to the north east is clear. There are many simpler versions decorated with animal heads or foreparts, a serpent or a variety of semi-geometric and animal patterns [329, 330], the latter with dissected wolves.119 Most are vertically, not horizontally composed. [331] is more sophisticated, with two slim predators attacking a deer.120 A few are mainly solid with straightforward relief figures of a winged horse or predator [332-324], 121 and for these at least the northeast of China seems indicated (see below) and they may be very late. A unique pair has a frontal bird grasping two small horses [335].122 The range of subjects on this series would be worth collecting for comparative study. Another, not openwork, has a group of a bird attacking a ram, from Derestuy, a subject which we shall meet again often on the BP New York, Thaw no. 71. Devlet, pl.28. 114. Gazette fig. 7 (from Mariassovo, Minussinsk Museum). 115 Sackler 79, fig. A112, from Xichagou (another, Wenwu 1960.8, 25-35, pl. 1), with a striated border. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 92. 116 K. Abdullaev in, A. Invernizzi (ed.), In the Land of the Gryphons (Florence 1995). 117 Sackler 271, fig. 238.1. New York, Thaw no. 80 [324]. Devlet, pl. 28.109 (7x6), 10, fig. 6.16. S. Minyaev, Orientations 29.7 (1998) 35, fig. 3. 118 New York, no. 163 [326] (5.7x5.4). London, BM 1950.11-16.9 [327](6x5). Cf. Sackler 336, F29, as modern. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 90 [328]. 119 Sackler 200, nos. 136, 136.1, with a pair of animal heads and necks, also found in Hebei; 82, fig. A121 with two wolf heads, from Daodunzi [330] (Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 10.8, pl. 17.6); no. 257, a coiled wolf. Devlet, fig. 3. 8, 9 and fig. 6. 1-2 (stylised frontal heads), fig. 6.10-13, pl. 28.104 [329] (6x4), 105-6, 107, 108, 111, 112, 113. Janssen 2007, no. 33. Berlin 2007, no. 15 (two rams’ heads). Various examples in Christies, London, 6 November 2009, nos. 10.2 (snake), 4 (boar and felines), 5 (felines), 6 (plait). 120 London, BM 1973.7-26.89 (5.6x4.1). 121 Devlet, fig. 5.1, 2, 3 [332, 334]. New York, Thaw no. 85, pair gilt, and no. 22 for a silver harness piece with a winged horse, earlier? [333](11.1x7) Sackler 304 (and for the site), figs. W16, 17 (from Laoheshen, Jilin province, NE Inner Mongolia). 122 Sackler 271, fig. 238.2, with much leafy feathering.

71

plaques [336]; 123 and another [337], 124 a border of circles and a facing deer, similar to the creatures on [406-409]. A brilliant tour-de-force in gold with inlays, in New York, has two twisted predators tackling two twisted ibexes; the sort of elaboration we might have looked for from the west and Peter’s Treasure [338*];125 and there is a bronze version of the same subject [339].126 The general type goes back to the fourth century at least, in an example composed simply of two stags [340].127 Finally, [341, 342] find kin both with the plaques here discussed and with the Rope-border series, 128 fine compositions of bird-heads with minor wild life. [343] relates to geometric patterns yet to be discussed.129 The northeast of China has been proposed as a source for the winged-horse plaques. These very clearly relate in overall shape to the forms of the very fine Chinese gold and gilt buckles with highly elaborate animal scenes upon them, including the dragon who has given birth to a shoal of fledglings.130 These come closer to the realism of the Xigoupan plaques, but are very much later - first century BC/AD. Many of the works discussed in the later part of this section must be second-century in date, some much later. The other plaque series now to be described form far more coherent groups.

123

Jettmar, 148, fig. 108. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 91. 125 New York 17.190.1672; Thaw no. 74; Golden Deer 5, fig. 3; textile-backed; Bunker 1970, no. 118 (7.9x6.7). Dittrich 1963, no. 72. 126 Harvard, Sackler Museum; Bunker 1970, no. 117, also textile-backed (7.6x6.6). 127 Wenwu 1980.7, 5, fig. 7.5. 128 Rudenko 1962, pl. 2.4 [341]. Jettmar pl. 13.2, Hamburg [342]. Cf. Traders no. 48. 129 Devlet 130 E.g., New York, Thaw nos.82, 83, 84 (the mother dragon), 86; Gems no. 113 (from Heigeda, Xinjiang). Literature on buckles, see China Archaeology and Art Digest 1.3 (1996) 166. The types described, Sun Ji, Wenwu 1994.1, 50-64. Discussed by V. von Griessmaier, Beiträge zur Kunst- und Kultur-Geschichte Asiens 7 (1933) 31-8. The dragon(ess) is not simply twisted but her back is broken and interrupted by various patterns – perhaps an indication of recent parturition. 124

72

Asymmetrical, BP plaques We return to groups of plaques more easily comparable with the Rope-border series, although quite distinct from it, and in a simplification of styles already met in the outline plaques - indeed many are basically outline plaques, although not of felines and oddly composed in a frame. They are so named for their asymmetrical shape, with a bulging upper border at one side, sometimes with two symmetrical bulges, where it may on occasion seem that the models or moulds for two mirror plaques were trimmed and combined; what I call ‘doublets’. The shapes suggest their designation - ‘BP’. It should be recalled that these plaques, as others in the last section, are normally found in mirror pairs, although I usually illustrate just one. All are roughly the same size as most Rope-borders, up to 12cm in length, some much less. I have included here, as much for convenience as anything, a number of more spectacular animal groups whose outlines are perhaps only incidentally BP, determined by their subjects or poses and without the defining border which is used for the more banal and mass-produced. The subjects are certainly related. This seems the only logical way to associate some of the finer pieces from Peter’s Treasure with their humbler and probably contemporary kin. Thus, at the head stand examples in gold, of exceptional quality and, for this, only loosely related to the main, generally less ambitious, BP series. They are in the Peter the Great Treasure, from far to the west of north China, but there are points of contact, not only in shape, with others considered here, and there were some simpler plaques of the regular BP type from the same region. Kerbschnitt techniques of body decoration play no role here, but various degrees of other early forms of realism, notably a rilled technique for some animal bodies, met in the Altai, most appropriate for tigers. The simpler BP plaques are far less ambitious. The most singular shows a python attacking a boar, a unique subject [344*] in this form (but compare [445, 446]). There are Asian pythons. It is inlaid in turquoise and blue paste.131 The second, a pair in openwork, has a muscular wolf, with the long turned-up muzzle familiar in the Rope-border series, but also with a crest and tail of eared bird-heads, 131

L'Asie des Steppes no. 5 (14x8.5); Dittrich 1963, no. 41. Bunker 1992a, 215, sees the snake embracing the victim (identified as a wolf), but it rather seems to be crushing it and beginning to swallow (starting at one paw). The boar’s head and tusk are unmistakable, but it has a rather long tail and the feet are almost feline - a common anatomical confusion met also in the Rope-border series.

73

also a feature of that series as we have seen, attacking a tiger with a lightly rilled body [345].132 This provides useful points for comparison with the Rope-borders of the east, including pre-Han, though Peter’s plaques must be Han in date. Yet another of Peter's gold plaques has more kin. It shows a tiger attacking a camel beside a tree, whose splaying branches create the bulging profile above [346].133 There is also a doublet of the subject [347].134 We have the rilled body again, in big tufts, while the camel resembles the Rope-border beasts and fights back, as camels do. This is a more prolific scheme. On [345-347] the bird-heads and the leaves do provide a regular border for the upper bulge, more like the simpler BP plaques, and justifying their inclusion beside them. The next examples to be considered, for their body-patterning, call also for a short diversion into Sarmatian art – an art mainly of the northern steppes in the last centuries BC. The inclusion with BP plaques might be regarded as accidental rather than a reflection of any very close association with others of this series. The famous gold feline and horse plaques from Peter’s Treasure [348*] have the same outline of the plaques just considered, but the composition and style owe far more to the west, with both bodies twisted and the attacker with little Persian horns and wings.135 The distinctive pattern of disc and triangles on the horse’s rump and shoulder and the attacker’s rump is a western feature which appears also on the tiny occidental gold griffin from the Oxus Treasure, 136 and on much that is taken to be Sarmatian work: ‘apples and pears’, it has been called, and in this ‘pure’ form cannot be too late although the general scheme persists on to the Tillya Tepe gold (first-century AD), and recurs on various works which seem to be or are related to ‘Sarmatian’, as the strange incomplete plaque from the lower Volga area [349].137 Another unusual and somewhat isolated pair in the Treasure is openwork, with a rilled tiger attacking a horse [350] bearing the same shoulder pattern as the last, a rather amateurish version of better kin, the border shape recalling that of buckles.138 132

L'Asie des Steppes no. 6 (16.8x10.1); Dittrich 1963, no. 11. Thaw 33, fig. 49; Golden Deer no. 211 (8x5.4); Rudenko 1962, pl. 5.2-3; Dittrich 1963, no. 18. 134 Rudenko 1962, pl. 5.1. 135 Often reproduced; as Or des Scythes no. 86 (19.3x12.3); Rudenko 1962, pl. 8.7-8; Dittrich 1963, no. 88. 136 See Rudenko 1962, 39; the Oxus Treasure griffin, Jettmar, pl. 32. And cf. the Oxus finger ring: J. Curtis and M.Kuszynski, Ancient Caucasian and Related Material in the British Museum (2002) nos. 171, 172 (griffin). 137 Verkhne-Pogromnoe barrow: Or des Scythes no. 154 (length 6.1); T.Sulimirski, The Sarmatians (1970) pl. 30; apparently mended in antiquity. And on the similar figure of a winged horned feline on a torque, ibid., pl. 9 (Rudenko 1962, pl. 17). The pattern apears on the Sarmatian bracelet in Cologne, Dittrich 1963, no. 96; Jettmar, pl. 33; and for the goat grappled by a big frontal eagle, Jettmar, pl. 37; Sulimirski, op.cit., pl.29; Rudenko 1962, pl. 19.1. Otherwise in Central Asia (as the Altai) it is the near-eastern disc and crescent(s) pattern which is adopted for the buttocks. 138 Rudenko 1962, pl. 8.5, 6. Jerusalem, BLM nos. 231-2 are two of bronze of the same shape with a silhouette tiger attacking a standing man; probably AD. 133

74

These are late creations and the finest of all these gold plaques might be judged simply grandiose versions of the run-of-the-mill BP plaques to which we now turn. On these the upper border of the bulge is more deliberate and regularly made by birds’ heads on antlers, leaves, wings, or is a real, solid border. A very popular subject - a stag attacked by a small feline - brings us close to the Ropeborders again, since the creature has a beaked head and its antlers carry eared bird-heads. Here we are dealing with artists not that far from the mainstream creators of the Ropeborders, but not early in that series. There is a kinship in style and detail, but without the Kerbschnitt and the claustrophobic compositions. There is an unusual example in gold from the Lake Baikal area [351], where the body is covered also with the relief image of two eared eagles, one with a ram's head in its beak, and the creature has a bird-ended tail too.139 This overlay scheme is one more familiar far to the west, with the Scythian Animal Style, but we have found it among our plaques. Similar carnivores attacking a beaked stag have plain bodies and are numerous [352-354].140 On some the attacker is omitted and the ‘stag’ has an equine mane also [355].141 On [356] the border is undecorated, enclosing the upturned horse attacked by a hairy, rilled tiger.142 On many others the rising upper border of the plaque is filled with the spread wings and tail feathers of a raptor eagle attacking a carnivore, which bites back. (There is a steatite relief version in a rectangular plaque with bar border [237]). On the bronze plaques the creatures have plain bodies [357], 143 but there are elaborate variants: flamboyant doublets [358], including one where two birds attack three ibexes [359], 144 and one where the prey is a goat, with a small tree beside it [360].145 A further variant from the Treasure with far more elaboration has a yak as prey, the bird also being attacked by a feline, again from Peter's 139

Golden Deer no. 210 (11.7x7.3); Bunker 1970, 107, fig. 18; Bunker 1992a, 207-209, fig. 3; Rudenko 1962, pl. 4.2; Thaw 33, fig. 48. From Verkhne-Udinsk (=Ulan-Ude, near Lake Baikal). 140 Bunker 1992a, 210, fig. 6, from Xichagou. Bunker 1970, no.124 [353] London, BM 1916.8-3.2 (11.7x7.9). New York, Thaw no. 72 [352] (12.1x8.3). [354] Traders no. 67 (New York, White/Shelby Coll.); Glories no. 48; Tokyo 1997, no.212, gilt pair. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 880. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 107. Taiyo Ltd., April 2005. Victoria Art Gallery, Till 2009, no. 57. 141 Rudenko 1962, pl. 8.3-4. 142 Rawson/Bunker, no. 216 (13.2x8). 143 [357] Sackler no. 222 (11.5x7.2). Heydt no. 3. David-Weill no. 46. Devlet, fig. 1.11, pl. 29.117 (from Urbyon, Siberia). Bunker 1992a, 210, fig. 4, from Xichagou. Tokyo 1997, no. 213. Barakat, London, 2009. Jerusalem, BLM no. 159. Cf. Gold no. 210, a simple gold version. 144 New York, Thaw no. 70 [358] (2.9x7.6). Dittrich 1963, no. 92, Stockholm [359]. Orientations 26.10 (1995) 45, fig., from Buryatia. A smaller variant has one bird perched on the back of its prey: Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 26.2 (Loo Coll.). 145 New York, Thaw no. 78 (9.8x5.7). 146 Rudenko 1962, pl. 4.3; Dittrich 1963, no. 91. Modern copy? – Barakat, 2004, LO.616.

75

Treasure [361], 146 while on another [363*] a griffin-headed horse is attacked by two predators and the eagle.147 A simpler version of eagle and yak alone is known [362].148 On a popular variant the predator has bird-head attachments to a crest and tail, meeting along its back [364, 365], the prey a horse.149 Broadly related are simple plaques, showing a small predator rather like a bear attacking an ibex from behind [366].150 These bring us to subjects with a human element and with borders which are sometimes solid (what we shall be calling 'bar-borders'), but some with a joined-leaf edge above. On one from the Gobi desert the scene is of a bear pulling down an ibex, a foreground tree providing the leafy top border [367].151 For the commoner subject the tree plays the same role, but there is a three-horse cart with a canopy and two or three passengers, and a hunting dog jumping up behind. In front is a fully dressed man wearing trousers and with a long sword [368].152 We are getting close here to a real narrative scene, although scarcely 'epic'. The commoner version has the cart, with a low canopy or load, drawn by two equids and a dog on top, beside the tree; the warrior, frontal, is here on horseback with his hand stretched out to the head of an indeterminate monster (a bear?) standing on its hind legs, also attacked by a dog [369, 370].153 So the whole looks like an episode on a journey. The lower edge is plain or with bar-sinkings, often stepped. Simpler versions of the shape, still with the leafy top, have an angular reclining camel [371], 154 or a camel attacked by a predator and the head of another, the border sketchily twisted rather than leafy [372, 373].155 One reverts to the ‘lifting prey’ motif [374].156

147

Rudenko 1962, pls. 3.5, 5.5. Dittrich, no. 90. Barakat Gallery. 149 Traders no. 91 [364](10.7x6.6). Rawson/Bunker, no. 217 [365](11x7.5), with references (Shaanxi, Derestuy, market). Glories no. 50. Art of the Ancient World (Royal-Athena) 18 (2007) no. 251. Bunker 1970, no. 125 (Pomerance Coll.). Bunker 1992a, 210, fig. 5, North Shaanxi. Sackler 87, fig. A135, from Derestuy. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 881. 150 [366] Dittrich 1963, no. 20 (Loo pl. 9.16) (6x3.3). Christies, London, 27 October 2009, no. 141. And cf. the grazing ibex doublet, ibid., 6 November, 2009, no. 9.6. 151 Sackler 275, fig. 243. 152 Sackler no. 243 (13.3x7); Tokyo 1997, no. 211. 153 Sackler 85, fig. A128, from Daodunzi (Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 10.6, pl. 16.3). New York, Thaw no. 81 [369] (White/Levy Coll.) (11.1x7.3). Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 885. Jerusalem, BLM no. 160. Traders no. 2, as from Xichagou) [370] (10.2x6.5) and for Xichagou, Wenwu 1960.8-9, fig. 17. Hong Kong 1996, no. 145. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 106. Rawson/Bunker, no. 228, with discussion. 154 Sackler 82, fig. A 118, from Daodunzi (Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 9.4, pl. 16.2). Janssens 2007, no.20 [371] (11.1x7.1). Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 888. 155 Sackler no. 223 [372] (12.4x6.9). Dittrich 1963, no. 74 (Mayer Coll.); Burlington Magazine 63, 183, pl. 3C; BMFEA 2 (1930), pl. 9.2. Nejstarsi Cinske Umeni (1990) no. 92 (pair; Prague). A.I. Kessler, Empires Beyond the Great Wall (1993) fig. 56 [373] (pair; Balinzuo Banner Mus.). 156 David Weill no. 57 (length 8.5). 148

76

The general scheme, with the human element included, also has its far more impressive golden expression in Peter's Treasure, with two realistic trees, one occupied by an ibex, while an elegant mounted archer, wearing a long sword (in the mirror version, showing his gorytos), leaps forward to shoot a boar, with a kneeling archer up in the tree (with quiver), and before him a rearing harnessed horse, all heavily inlaid in turquoise [375, 376]. The horseman’s ‘flying gallop’ presents a motif unfamiliar on our plaques but with a long pedigree, west to east, here in the Chinese manner with ‘flipped’ rear hooves.157 A yet more famous pair of gold plaques from the Treasure, of the same shape but with no inlay and in a far more mannered style, has the tree but with drooping leaves, beneath which sits a woman wearing a full robe and a tall ceremonial Chinese hat, nursing the body of a dressed man (eyes open), while another man sits holding the guide-rope of a pair of horses, with an arrow case (gorytos) and bow hanging in the tree [377, 378*].158 There is no heroic action here but surely a mythical if not historical identity. A less ambitious gold plaque, not from the Treasure, has a wolf chasing a boar in a thicket [379].159 These golden plaques surely bring us well into the second century BC, if not later. [380] offers simply a harnessed horse, as on the big plaques, with a man before it, from Sibirsk, only roughly relevant here, for its subject.160 There are a very few rectangular plaques deriving from the last for their subjects and style and therefore deserving inclusion here. One famous type, borderless but for the leaves of two trees along the edge, shows two harnessed horses observing a wrestling match between two Asians [381-384]. A pair were found near Xian, but hardly for a Chinese.161 Another repeats the familiar laden two-horse cart (eleven-spoked, not six) with driver, in this case carrying two people whose busts we see, and led by a man, with the equally familiar trees and with a skirted figure busy before them - far more domestic in mood, and in a plain rectangular frame, sometimes with pierced corners [385, 386].162 Here too perhaps go plaques with warriors at each end, a blank tray between them possibly for a stone inset or painting, and birds above and below the tray [387, 388].163 157

Thaw 35, fig. 53; Bunker 1992a, 211-3, fig. 7; and often. On the flying gallop, I.B. Jaffe in Art Bulletin 65.2 (1983) 183-200, esp. 194. 158 Golden Deer no. 212; Or des Scythes no. 85 (15.2x12.1), also for the headdress; et saepe. 159 Gold no. 211. 160 Sackler, 95, fig. A148. 161 From Kexingzhuang (near Xian), tomb 140, Sackler 86, fig. A131; Devlet, fig. 2.8; Bunker 1992a, 212, fig. 8. Traders no. 1 (14.4x7.1). [382] Jettmar pl. 52. Heydt no. 1. Bunker 1992b, 110, fig. 21.14, from Daodunzi. Berlin 2007, no. 65 = Tokyo 1997, no. 214 [381](13.2x6.7). [383, 384] London, V&A 180-1951 (13.4x7). Rawson/Bunker, no. 221, with discussion. It may be a quiver-gorytos that hangs from the saddle of the left-hand horse. 162 Traders no. 3 [385] (11x5.8); Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 887. [386] Jerusalem, BLM no. 21 (10.3x5.6); no. 179. A fragment, with just the man, Hong Kong 1996, no. 146. China Archaeology and Art Digest 3.2/3, 212 for examples from Jiefangyingzi (east Inner Mongolia): Wenwu 1998.7, 42-3. 163 Sackler 84, fig. A127, from Daodunzi (Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 9.11, pl. 14.2). Better preserved, David-

77

Drop borders The 'drops' are leaf-shaped, as used for both leaves and hoofs. We have met them already as leaf-borders on trees (on the BP plaques); they easily also suggest, may be suggested by and are used as cavities for inlay. The prime examples, of gold, with inlays (turquoise, coral, amber) are, unusually for this series, solid, from Sidorovka near Omsk in western Siberia. This is very much a steppe product, also for its subject which makes concessions to Chinese, a contorted long-necked dragon being attacked by two tigers, with at least one other small creature involved (top right of centre, and see top left) [389].164 The plaques, a pair, are not openwork and they carry a lot of body detail, in manes and necks. The dragon seems a vulpine forerunner of the Han type, and the twisting composition has as much of China about it as of the steppe. There is an openwork example from Ivolga tomb 100 [390], 165 in the north, and numerous others in openwork in the same style, or barely simplified, on which the subject is clearer [391, 392], 166 as well as one executed in nephrite [236]. On [391, 392] the creature involved right of centre top looks like a small bear. Most are gilt and without inlays, the 'drops' becoming mere pattern. None in this group show the group mirrored on companion plaques. A unique gold plaque with turquoise and shell inlays has a tiger and an eagle attacking a fallen reindeer - a clear indication of steppe origin [393*], 167 but here we are dealing with a notably different style which merges naturally into the ‘Sarmatian’, or derives from it. Indeed, the same group and style, differently composed so as to wrap around a gold flask, appears in the west in the lower Don area [394].168 Only its border places [393*] here. And, despite its plain border, [395] also comes here for its comparable westerly style and subject – a real griffin attacking a tiger, itself attacking a deer with bird-topped antler.169

Weill no. 59 [387] (11x6); Los Angeles, Heeramaneck no. 886. Jerusalem, BLM no. 116 (pair) [388]. 164 Thaw 31, fig. 45; Sackler 88, fig. A137, and on no. 242. Interactions 287, fig. 17.25. 165 Sackler 88, fig. A136. A.V. Davidova, Sov.Arkh. 1971.1, fig. 2. 166 E.g. Devlet, fig. 1.1, fig. 5.1, pls. 11-12.43-45; New York, Thaw no. 105 [391] (14x6.7). Sackler no. 242 [392] (14.1x6.8); Tokyo 1997, no. 215. Dittrich 1963, no. 7 (Loo Coll.). From Ivolga – Sov.Arkh. 1971.1, 96, fig. 2. E.&J. Frankel, New York, 2006. 167 New York, Thaw no. 115 (White/Levy Coll.) (11.7x7.6). 168 Novocherkassk: S. Reinach, Repertoire de Reliefs 3 (1912) 516, 3; E. Minns, Scythians and Greeks (1913) 234, fig. 141; Antiquity 37 (1963) pl. 29. With it are BP plaques set on iron plates with similar, not quite the same, animals: American Journal of Archaeology 86 (1982) 470 169 Rudenko 1962, pls. 2.5, 8.1 [2886]. Dittrich 1963, no. 89. (15x7.5)

78

Another inlaid (stones and glass) gold plaque, in Peter the Great's Treasure [396], 170 has two twisted dragons heraldically confronting a tree, hind-legs splayed in the common Han manner. The pair was accompanied by miniatures of the same subject [397], and there is a bronze version from Daodunzi [398].171 The device appears also on what seems a purely Chinese belt hook [399].172 The gold versions at least have textile backs, indicating the same casting technique as that observed in the Rope-border series. The twisted bodies recall the Rope-borders and many Asian animals. In a very different style (and hammered, not cast?) is a pair of plaques from Aluchaideng in the north, with two eagles attacking a fallen camel, the border being drops and circles [400].173 This is probably earlier, though possibly not as early as the rectangular plaques from the north already discussed, and a forerunner of the rest of the drop-borders, with discs among its drops. It recalls some hammered gold plaques with camels from the west (Filippovka [245]), and might be regarded as further evidence for the east-west link, perhaps even an import. The drop border appears also on a number of openwork bronze plaques, some gilt, in a style far simpler than those so far considered, but not without some attention to detail, the bodies plain and seldom with inner markings, but not flat. Sizes vary considerably. Subjects are: two horses fighting [401-403], some smaller in a more square composition [404, 405].174 We see also a feline attacking a stag or a gazelle with frontal head [406-409];175 three ibexes, the centre one frontal [410-412];176 and a version of the same with the centre animal’s body omitted, leaving just its horns [413, 414].177 The two camels with a tree

170

Jettmar, pl. 39; Thaw 32, fig. 46; Rudenko 1962, pls. 3.9, 9.6. Thaw 32, fig. 47; Sackler 82, fig. A120, from Daodunzi. 172 Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 9.10, pl. 16.4; Glories no. 53 (11.3x3.8). 173 L’Asie des Steppes no. 114 (18x7.5). 174 New York, Thaw no. 104 [401] (12.7x5.7), with further references (Xinjiang). Sackler 87, fig. A134 from Derestuy [402], and nos. 224, 225, 226. Traders no. 8 [405] (White/Levy Coll.) (5.3x3.3), with references. Boston Museum of Fine Art 50.1892, Hoyt Coll. (1954) no. 560 (like [401]). David-Weill no. 73. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 877. Devlet, pls. 7.24; 8; 9.29-32.34; 10.33, 35, 36, 42. London, BM 1947.713.365 [403]. Bunker 1970, no. 122 (Seattle). London, BM 1950.11-18.11. Sackler 82, fig. A119 from Daodunzi (Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 9.6, pl. 17.3). 175 Sackler 84, fig. A126 from Daodunzi [406] (Kaogu xuebao fig. 9.8, pl.17.2), and no. 232 [407](10.9x5.3). Dittrich 1963, no. 16. [408] London, BM 1950.11-16.2. Heydt no. 4. Devlet, fig. 1.10. Janssens 2007, no. 23 [409](11x5.6). Barbier, Geneva no. 47. Jettmar, pl. 28.2. Victoria Art Gallery, Till 2009, no. 61. For the prey, and with curved outline, cf. Duan Shu’an 1995, no.91 [337]. 176 Sackler no. 231a [410] (13.7x6.6) with references. New York, Thaw no. 108 [411] (13.9x6.7). New York, MM 28.68.4. London, BM [412]. 177 Kaogu yu wenwu 1988.3, 19, fig. 6.2 from Lijiataozi (Tongxin, Ningxia). Glories no. 51. Sackler no. 231b. Devlet, fig. 2.7. Baltimore 54.2402 [413](12x6.3). David-Weill no. 68. Heydt no. 2. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 875. Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 122 [414]. Taiyo Ltd., 2005. Jerusalem, BLM no. 155. 171

79

familiar from the Rope-border series also appear in an emaciated form [415, 416].178 A border including tendrils holds pairs of horses attacked by felines [417].179 The drop border also appears with some Geometric devices (see below). And this seems the best place for the large plaque [418], and a fragment [419], for its leafy bottom edge; the unusual subject is an eagle spread over a dog and a bear, with a wolf or bear head behind it; the centrepiece is strange.180 The eagle superficially recalls the more sophisticated birds on saddle plaques from the Altai, dated to the late sixth century.181 For all their distinguished golden kin these bronzes are run-of-the-mill products surely dating even well into the first century BC. The same is true of the next which are closely related in general style but with a different iconography to go with the different borders. Just one example we have already seen has a mix of drop and bar border [401], so there is some connection between the two, perhaps geographical, probably temporal.

Bar borders On these plaques the borders are of a succession of rectangular sinkings, as though for inlays, sometimes with a small raised centrepiece, doubled or pinched. (We have met already some which are ‘stepped’ [369, 370]). The majority resemble the drop-border plaques in style and must be near-contemporary, although generally not sharing devices, with the sole exception of the fighting horses. For these we have also seen examples showing both border types [401]. Compositions are similar but with a fondness for the strictly symmetrical, and in this, but nothing else, they resemble the Rope-border series. The bronze is rarely gilt and there are no de luxe specimens. The best have a fight between a serpentine dragon and a tiger, less complex than that at the head of the drop-borders [389], but still intricate, with bodies crossing, and once with a tree [420-422].182 There are several strange variants. On [423] there is virtually a doublet.183 A 178

Devlet 1980, fig. 1.4. From Daodunzi, Kaogu xuebao 1988.3, fig. 9.5, pl. 16.1. Rawson/Bunker no. 227 [415] (10x5). Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 114 [416]. Eskenazi, London, 9 June-8 July, 1977 , no. 40 (ex-Loo). 179 New York, Thaw no.69 (14.6x8.3). 180 Hong Kong 1996, no. 149 [418] (13x7). London, BM 1936.11-18.141 [419] (7.1x6.1). 181 Thaw 22, fig. 30, from Bashadar. 182 London, BM 1936.11-18.140 [420] = the mirror pair to [421] V&A Museum M556-1936 (12.6x6.8). Devlet, fig. 3.6. On a variant the animals' heads face in not out: Devlet, fig. 9, from Mongolia. [422] Jettmar, pl. 25.3; Bunker 1970, no. 119; Dittrich 1963, no. 4. There are no mirror versions.

80

fine composition has an interlaced pair of dragons [424] recalling Rope-Border Type 45.184 Variants have an angular mix of dragons and predators, not all easily deciphered [425427].185 There are several fighting horses resembling those with drop-border [428, 429]; one with a tree between [430] from eastern Mongolia.186 Simplest are some animal pairs: grazing horses [431-433];187 birds, alone with entwined heads [434], 188 or, oddly, picking at a fish on a platform with a predator intervening [435-437];189 the birds are not readily identified – they look like predatory ducks. There are ibexes back-to-back [438, 439];190 and, very commonly, a pair of oxen with facing heads and leafy-shaggy bodies [440442].191 Finally, a figure-of-eight snake [443].192 [444] is in a totally different but plausible style, the predator poised over the prey. It seems ancient.193 This series clearly relates to the drop-border plaques and must be from neighbouring workshops, less ambitious, probably contemporary, mainly far from China.

183

Nejstarai Cinske Umeni (1990) no. 104 (Prague; pair). Also Minussinsk Museum, Bull.Anc.Orient Museum 3 (1981) ‘from Bactria’. 184 Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 120.` 185 [425] Devlet 19, fig. 9; [426] pl. 12.46. [427] David-Weill no. 31 (9.7x4.5). 186 Cahn Katalog 19, 2007, no. 31. Berlin Ostasiat.Mus. 1965-131: Berlin 2007, no. 58 = Tokyo 1997, no. 217 [428] (14.3x6.9). Heydt no. 6 (Loo pl. 27.5). Devlet, fig. 1.8, pl. 10. 35, 36, 37; and an odd variety, one horse with head turned up, Devlet, pl. 9.39 [429]. Sackler 261, fig. 224.1 [430]. Dittrich 1963, no. 15. Kaogu 1986.10, 888, figs. 2, 4. J.-D. Cahn, Basel. 187 Sackler no. 237 [431] (9.8x4.8). Heydt no. 8. David-Weill no. 18. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 884. Devlet, fig. 1.2, 3, pl. 7.20-22. Bunker 1970, no. 126 (Philadelphia). Jettmar, pl. 13.1 (Hamburg); 25.3 [432], with ribbed border. London, V&A Museum M17-1948. [433] Jerusalem, BLM no. 6 (6.5x3, pair) is silver and has a geometricised borders, like an open maeander; also ibid., no. 113. Fragment, Christies, London, 6 November 2009, no. 26.5. 188 [434] Sackler no. 239; ex-Mayer Coll., BMFEA 5, pl. 9.1. David-Weill nos. 16, 69. Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 883. Rostovtseff 1929, pl. 28.3. Transiart, 2004. 189 Sackler no. 238 a and b [435, 436], (10.1x5.1; 10.2x5.1). Dittrich 1963, no. 71 [437] (Loo Coll.; width 10.5). Devlet, fig. 3.1. Jerusalem, BLM no. 22. 190 Devlet, fig. 2.6 [438]. Lally, 2004 [439]. David-Weill no. 42. Heydt no. 5. 191 [440] New York, Thaw no. 113 (11.7x5.4). Bunker 1970, no. 127 (Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 882). Devlet, figs. 1.1, 7, 6.5-7, pls. 1-7. London, BM 1950.11-16.3 [441](10.9x5.5). Heydt no. 7 (Loo pl. 11.4). Jettmar, pl. 28.1. Rawson/Bunker, no. 222. [442] Duan Shu’an 1995, no. 117. A small singleton, Heydt no. 68. 192 Sackler no. 227 (3.3x2.7). 193 Jerusalem, BLM no. 102 (9.1x6.8). Addendum: see Korolkova 2006 for camel imagery on these plaques, including fig. 8.8, a subject for the barborders not noticed above: camels fighting.

81

Other The use of the term ‘other’ is in itself a token of impotence in the face of so much variety, although some comfort may be taken from the fact that so very many of what have been found/published can be allotted to groups and series that are likely to have some historical reality. I cannot easily attach to any of the foregoing series some long thin plaques in gold with animal subjects and plain borders. Two pairs in St Petersburg [445, 446]194 are of a python attacking a wolf or boar, which was a subject for [344*] which is far more compact. [447] has acceptable subjects, tiger versus camel, but with oddly patterned bodies and in an unfamiliar, flat style with linear relief lines and dots.195 Plain-bordered [448] with a tiger and twisted stag carries body patterns reminiscent of both Kerbschnitt and our [277, 278].196 In the same style and with the same border is the belt hook [449].197 Finally, there is a strange gilt plaque from the market, probably too strange to be a forgery, which has a realistic tiger carrying the body of a man on its back, with arcs in the border [450]; the pose is a proper one for tigers with their prey (compare Yunnan bronzes), but the human prey is unique.198 It may be very much later than others considered here, simply attesting a continuing interest in and practice of the genre.

'Punched' and Geometric The very latest, of the first centuries BC/AD, are the simplest in subject and technique bronze and some gold. They probably belong for the most part to the Xianbei, successors to the Xiongnu. (I cite in the notes here only those I also illustrate; there are dozens more in publications.) Openwork is dominant, and on those with animals much of it seems almost to have been punched away from the plaque, either in the metal sheet or in the casting model.

194

Rudenko 1962, pls. 9.1-2, 12.4-5; Dittrich 1963, no. 40; Jettmar, pl. 40; Or des Scythes no. 88 (length 14.5). 195 Market (Transiart) (length 11). 196 New York, Levy/White; Glories no. 52 (9.5x5.2). 197 Thaw no. 124 (20.3x7). 198 Once Elsworth Coll.; Sotheby’s 19 March, 2002.

82

The subjects of the most summary are two or three quadrupeds [451-454] 199 or two ibexes with wheel motifs in the background [455].200 Of the geometric patterns (and compare our ovoid [343]), of those with zigzags some have drop borders [456, 457], 201 are embellished with animal heads [458], 202 or are bossed [459].203 Others have a net pattern, rather resembling bedsteads, it may be, and are also bossed [460, 461] or plain [462, 463].204 Some appear as parallel snakes [464, 465].205 The geometric examples go back to the period of the drop- and bar-border plaques, for some of their borders; the ‘punched’ may run well into years AD. They are a sorry finale to a brilliant series.

199

New York, Thaw no. 154 [451] (7.6x4.8). Sackler nos. 250a [452] (7.7x5), 248 [454](7.3x5.4). L’Asie des Steppes no. 147 [453] (6.7x4.4). S. Minyaev in Davis-Kimball 2000, 2933-303 on this ‘Geometric Style’ and Xiongnu art. 200 New York, Thaw no. 117. London, BM 1947.7-12.364 [455] (98x73). Jettmar, pl. 28.3. 201 Devlet, fig. 1.5 [456]. David-Weill no. 21 [457] (11x5.6). 202 Devlet 20, fig. 10 [458] (12x6.8); Los Angeles: Heeramaneck no. 879. 203 David-Weill no. 49 (10x6). 204 Sackler, no. 235 a, b [460, 461] (9.1x5.8;7.8x5.2). David-Weill nos. 33, 34 [462] (11x5.6). Devlet fig. 3.7 [463]. 205 David-Weill no. 60 [464] (10x5). Devlet pl. 13.49 [465].

83

84

CHAPTER IV CONCLUSIONS

The material considered in this monograph presents notable problems and possibilities on both the archaeological-historical front and the art-historical. In the introduction I remarked the apparent parallel between what happened in the western areas of Central Asia from about the sixth century BC on, where settled or colonial Greeks met nomad (though by then settling) Scythians and supplied them with objects which were often in Greek style but for Scythian purposes, as was demonstrated by their shapes. It was not, on the whole, a happy marriage. In the east it has seemed that China might have served much the same purpose for its nomad neighbours, with the difference that these neighbours were powerful enough to threaten China itself, especially in periods when there was no central power, and that there had been a strong tradition of metallurgy among the nomads, 206 although necessarily not as monumental as with the Chinese. Moreover, there flourished in Asia a nomad iconography very unlike the Chinese, so iconography has to prove a vital guide. The Greek/Chinese parallel is flawed in other ways. To the Greeks the Scythians were utter barbarians, bar-bar speakers of a strange language, and the Greeks used the term barbaros, coined before the Greeks became properly aware of ‘barbarian’ cultures which were far older then theirs and from which they had much to learn (in the east and Egypt). The distinction between Chinese and nomad was more subtle. Appearance, much in the way of dress and apparently even speech may have been shared. Many north Chinese were no doubt pastoralists, just as some big nomad settlements suggest a serious interest in agriculture. The differences were more subtle. ‘For the ancient Chinese it was not primarily race or language but culture, which distinguished them from the barbarian tribes. Their own Chinese-ness lay in the elaborate and stately rituals and ceremonies by which they ordered their lives and the superior moral qualities which these rites engendered and of which they 206

See Jianjun Mei in Proceedings of the British Academy 121 (2003) 1-39.

85

were in turn the outward expression. . . “What distinguishes the people of the Middle Kingdom from the barbarian tribes is that they are capable of honouring that which should be honoured”’.207 It was a difference of organisation and status, between powerful monarchies with numerous nomad subjects and few settled communities, and a complex of principalities with dynastic interconnections and rivalries, practising monumental arts and architecture, of some complexity and variety, though all distinctively ‘Chinese’. This is not the place to discuss east/west nomad parallels in detail but it is worth observation that accounts of the nomads, from west and east, by Herodotus and the ‘Great Historian’ of China, correspond at many points, despite some classical historians’ disdain for Herodotus’ truthfulness.208 To the north and west, in the steppes, an animal style, including the Animal Style of the Scythians as it was experienced by the Greeks, was dominant. The human element in it was minimal and the conceptual approach to animal bodies was to energize them by distortion and combination. Although nomads do in fact spend much of their lives in a settled state, even if in more than one location, there was a natural propensity for portability, and so dress, dress ornament and harness were major fields for the artist. In North China the society must have been mixed and the distinction nomad/settled becomes blurred, but not by much, and in political/military terms it soon was to justify the creation of local walls, then a Great Wall, the beginnings of which go back to the fourth century BC. In China mass and material (bronze, precious metals, jade, silks) demonstrated power, and the fields for decoration provided by major works, from statuary (relatively rare) to bronze vessels and bells, jade, lacquer and silks, encouraged the development of styles, mainly of overall decoration often with a major animal element, however stylised, but occasionally of relatively simple narrative, down to and into the Han period, when both figure narrative and landscape began to play a more conspicuous role. The elements of the overall decoration were partly geometric, of a type met all over the world, but especially also elements inspired by the animal world, even if this was not always made explicit. This makes for fluid and interlocking compositions, also, abetted by the forms of the objects decorated, a degree of interest in what we would call the heraldic, or at least symmetrical and mirrored, giving rise, par excellence, to the taotie motifs. This is much the spirit of the earliest outline plaques considered here, but they have also something of the western nomad Animal Style to them, at least in subject matter. If any of the early creatures does look more like a lion (long unknown to the Chinese)209 than a tiger or other feline predator, it may be from arts which were also heavily influenced from the west, from Persia (manifest in the Altai), and even as far away as Greece.210 But the special character of Chinese arts BC lies in the great 207

B. Watson, Ssu-ma Chien Grand Historian of China (New York 1958) 10-11. See especially Hyun Jin Kim, Ethnicity and Foreigners in Ancient Greece and China (Duckworth, 2009), and in Ancient West and East forthcoming. 209 Our [2] from the Altai has certainly a ‘western’ lion. 210 Apart from the remarkable [310*] I am not inclined to see much direct or indirect influence from Greek or 208

86

variety of styles which could be practised contemporaneously, distinguished by medium – bronze, gold, lacquer, textile, jade, painting, clay – a variety unrivalled in ancient art anywhere, and presumably indicative of strong craft traditions and independence in the practices in each medium. In metalwork, it seems, there was room for further diversity accommodating subjects and styles reflecting steppe art, since the art of our ‘outline plaques’ and even the Rope-borders is seldom quite that of the more obviously ‘Chinese’ bronzes. Observation of realistic action – twisted fighting groups and the like – did not inevitably go with observation of realistic detail in animal forms; whence perhaps our problems with wrong shapes for tails, feet, muzzles, which were not necessarily designed in these unexpected forms to give an effect of mystery or of the monstrous. The supernatural was never far away but is not obvious in these arts; even the ruc-like behaviour of the eared eagles with massive prey is not that far from the behaviour of raptors in nature. The minimal use of the human figure in our series is remarkable, given the role of the shaman, let alone the military or dynastic leader, especially in comparison with Chinese artists’ growing interest in their demons and ‘immortals’ of varying status and appearance, animal and humanoid.211 Realism in the Greek sense, even the stylised realism which the Greeks had picked up from the Near East in the eighth/seventh century BC and then developed in their own way, is not positively sought. When it does appear, as in our [310*], we may suspect an influence which goes outside the Chinese and local nomadic; and which has indeed still to be satisfactorily explained for the comparably realistic animal forms of the bronzes of Yunnan far to the south. Otherwise, it is more a matter of recorded observation - of the disposition of a yak’s hair, the mechanism of an eagle’s claws. Wolves and felines may have been the real predators, but their treatment by artists seldom does more the approximate to nature. On the other hand, a few subjects, especially on the truly nomad plaques, carry a measure of close observation of animal behaviour – the alert ibexes with heads raised looking into the distance [410-414], the horses fighting for leadership of the herd [401-405], the predators lifting and even carrying their prey [274-281], angry camels. It is not, I think, an idle observation, that there is much more realism and proper observation of nature on the plaques which seem purely ‘nomad’ (the BPs, drop- and bar-borders, various buckles) than among the Rope-borders, where, from the beginning, ordinary animals are readily distorted into monsters, and correct animal details are often ignored, with rare exceptions, as with the small plaques with oxen which are virtually ‘Han-realistic’ (Type 41). Greek-influenced arts in what is studied here, although much is made by some of the legacy of Alexander even so far east. At best, I think, the head of the far-wandering Greek sea-monster (ketos) was observed by the inventors of the Han dragon: the author in After Alexander (eds., J. Cribb, G. Herrmann, Oxford 2007) 23-4. Persian influence is another matter, but not easy to define; see Rawson 1999, 51-2. 211 A Corpus of the iconography of these figures would be welcome; along with relevant literature.

87

All this reflects especially upon most of the plaques discussed in Chapter III, for which the label ‘made in China’ seems quite inadequate, whatever inscriptions may be found on a very few. In them we find a range of treatment from the elaboration of the gold, mainly from Peter’s Treasure, to the relatively summary treatment of the majority of the rest, in contrast with the more ‘Chinese’ early outline plaques, which match far better the work on major Chinese bronzes, and not only in their decorative body-patterning. Places of manufacture are as yet impossible to determine. So many of the plaques of our Chapter III come from quite far to the west, including the very finest (in Peter the Great’s Treasure) that we may presume production in Siberia far from the Wall, with or without any form of direct Chinese inspiration. But nomad metalworkers were not novices. Very few groups have been noted as having any more localised vogue, as those from around Lake Baikal in the north. The fact that one Ordos site, Daodunzi, within the Wall (just), represents virtually all the known plaque types, including the Rope-borders, has been remarked as a discouraging pointer to deducing sources from find-places.

History and the Rope-border plaques Relating art to politics is another matter. Historical records about Chinese history in the relevant period are not lacking and are often detailed but are generally not contemporary. It is clear that our plaques begin in the Warring States period, when the northern borders were controlled mainly by the Zhao and Qin states. There was constant hostile interaction with nomad powers beyond, in this period notably the Xiongnu in the north, and the Yuezhi more westerly. The situation seems to have been one of constant friction, with the Chinese attempting to appease the nomads, who were powerful and well organised, by gifts and even, it is believed, artefacts.212 This is thought to explain the gold of the northerly sites of Aluchaideng, Xigoupan and the area generally, already discussed. The important characteristic of these finds for us is that they also present the earliest complex of rectangular, bordered metal plaques as opposed to outline animal plaques or the like, otherwise current in the north and in China, where they no doubt served similar purposes, to decorate belts, harness or dress. Moreover, their decoration with animals and animalfights [299-306] presage clearly both the compositions and actors which we see on the Rope-border plaques. These too are distinguished from all the nomad production of the last centuries BC, surveyed in the rest of the last chapter, by including many types 212

On the interaction of nomad and sedentary in this and the following period see Xinru Liu in Journal of World History 12.2 (2001) 261-92. There is a good account of the character and interaction of sedentary and nomad in Inner Asia in Sinor (ed.) 1990, Introduction. And see Watson, loc.cit. (n. 207).

88

manufactured with their very substantial rectangular frames, unlike the far flimsier works of obvious nomad origin and use. The historical record may supply an answer. In the fourth century BC the kings of Zhao decided to adapt their tactics against the nomad by promoting and reforming their cavalry, no doubt at the expense of their chariotry. The ‘Great Historian’ of China writes: ‘At the same time King Wuling of Zhao changed the customs of his people, ordering them to adopt barbarian dress and to practise riding and shooting, and then led them north in a successful attack on the Forest Barbarians and the Loufan’.213 This was in 307 BC. This meant Chinese would be wearing trousers with a belted jacket, short or long. Buckles (xibi) had been a regular feature of Chinese inventories, usually for finer dress. The phenomenon of adopting the tactics, equipment and dress of adversaries is well documented in other periods: to mention only the more relevant, some Greeks may or may not have adopted Scythian dress for archers but they learned their equipment (they were not normally fighting Scythians but exploiting them); the Persians learnt about cavalry from the Medes and at the same time adopted their dress; later, the Seleucid Greeks copied the dress and chariotry of their eastern enemies. Heavy and tight belts seem a characteristic of eastern mounted archers although in the representations of them I have failed to find any detailing of their decoration in either nomad or Chinese works (e.g., the terracotta cavalrymen);214 but the surviving plaques tell their own story of their widespread use. If Chinese cavalry were now to wear dress of nomad type, the belt fastenings and the plaques, which would have been a required element, had their models already in the gold plaques of the north, for both their form and their subject compositions, while the rope border was already an established Chinese pattern. And we have a connection in the common style of the inscriptions on the northern (Xigoupan) plaques and on material from the Xinzhuangtou complex, which yielded the earliest group of Rope-border plaques that we have from within the kingdom of Zhao, as well as other works in the same style.215 There must be a connection, and maybe the two finds are not as far from each other in date as may have seemed. This could be the situation from which a Chinese belt-plaque series was born.

213

Records of the Grand Historian: Han Dynasty II (translated by Burton Watson) II (New York 1961) 133. Usefully summarized in di Cosmo 2002, 134-5, 234; and see Xinru Liu (last note} 284-6, on the dress but not dwelling on the belts. 214 The buckle (daigou) on one of the terracotta warriors is the familiar ovoid hook type: Brinker and Goepper, Kunstschätze aus China (Zurich 1981/2) 124, fig. 22, 126. Some, belting knee-length tunics, have plain rectangular elements. 215 Treated in detail in Li Xueqin 1985, 333-6; ‘made by the people of Zhao specifically to be either traded or given to the peoples in the north’.

89

It is likely too that there was Chinese precedent in the older outline plaques, if they were so used, but we cannot yet closely locate their areas of production. However, the account above of ovoid and similar buckle-like plaques provides links between purely Chinese objects and decoration and pieces made by or for the nomad. Given the other evidence about the origins of the Rope-border series it seems quite plausible that this was the Chinese answer to the problem of fancy buckling for their new belts. The start of the series may well have lain within the reign of Wuling (325-299 BC), if not earlier, and the newly developed style had a wider, if localised, effect, to judge from the finds in Xinzhuangtou tomb 30, the models at the Qin-kingdom site of Beikang, and the adoption of the style to decorate a variety of other, Chinese, objects. The treatment of the figures was wholly novel, however, and only dependent on nomad art for elements of subject and pose. Much appears to have emerged from Chinese practice, however much it might seem distinct from the tradition of their earlier big bronzes or jade, or even the outline plaques. However, in the early plaques we are faced with an odd combination of subjects which are related, however loosely, to the subjects of steppe art, and styles which seem even more loosely related to Chinese arts. There might be an explanation for this. The early style owes something to woodwork, whence the ubiquitous Kerbschnitt on the early plaques, and for all we can tell it resembled Chinese wood-working of the period and area where the earliest bronze plaques were designed. Its use as body-patterning rather than articulation of real body parts is not a nomad usage. The phenomenon of different styles in Chinese art for different media is well enough attested and has been remarked already. And when we get to the Han series we know that the Han artist had a clear interest in the depiction of animals, usually not fighting, and in a semi-realistic style which might even owe something to the new Chinese ‘animal-belt style’, almost a ‘rustic country style’, 216 and what seems a more conscious awareness of the steppe, or rather the appeal of mountain and forest and their wild life. Imitation of the dress of others allows of some surrender also of decorative preferences and even style, and may indeed have stimulated stylistic innovation by gifted artists. But it is clear that the subject matter is treated, as time passes, in a more and more typically Chinese manner, with borrowing from other Chinese arts, culminating in the dragons, tortoises and landscapes of Types 24, 44-6, which are not conceivably nomad in inspiration or execution or intention. To these Chinese traits add [212, 213] (clearly the work of Han jewellers); and the Chinese-posed felines [49, 148] (compare one on textile [466]), 217 and dancing bear [220]; and the luxury of B/W 2, gold on silk belts. The new policy in favour of armed cavalrymen created at the same time a demand for better, that is, larger horses, leading to the famous recruiting of the great Ferghana horses in 216

Useful on the Han animal style, and much else, W. Watson, Style in the Arts of China (1974) 51-2 and ch.

2.

217

Beside the lion a ‘lotus and palmette’ of very classical aspect.

90

the second century BC, following the tracks of the Yuezhi who had been displaced west by the Xiongnu.218 The early Han negotiated with the Xiongnu, and fought them, to little effect, and the nomad dominance in north China was only effectively halted in the first century BC after bitter warfare and unusual attempts at diplomacy and bribery. Han silks were not as much use to nomads as leather and felt.219 The nomads went on wearing their belts, attested all over north China and far to the west;220 the Chinese went on with theirs at least until the Xiongnu were defeated, but the mode of rectangular panels with animal subjects persisted for centuries. Their kinship to the belt plaques of the Sarmatians, Parthians, 221 Sasanians, registers merely one aspect of their appeal and historical importance. A common description of many ‘Ordos bronzes’ as ‘made by the Chinese for the nomads’, or as purely nomad production, needs some modification in favour of adding ‘some made by the Chinese for themselves’, for the Rope-border series at least, while much nomad work was heavily influenced by Chinese techniques with metals. For the majority of the later specimens outside this series we must obviously judge them purely nomad production, and much of it far to the west and north, whether or not there was or had been experience of Chinese technical expertise in the production of some of the luxury specimens of Peter’s Treasure, as there almost certainly was in some details of alloying, gilding, etc. It remains to be seen whether closer definition of groups and proveniences will lead to association of them with specific nomad groups. But, for the Chinese, the animal world of their generally friendly ‘demons’ and their animal companions is never far away, nor so foreign to the environment of the nomads. And as a historical, archaeological and art-historical phenomenon, these plaques may be seen to pose questions of far more than local, Asian significance.

218

See Xinru Liu, op.cit., 287; di Cosmo 2002, 233. Some think the ‘divine’ horses of Ferghana a product of Chinese imagination and myth, but they seem real enough. Cf. R. Sterckx, The Animal and the Demon in Early China (Albany 2002) 184. I suspect ‘heroic’ versions of them are shown at Tillya Tepe in the first century AD: Ancient West and East 2 (2003) 356-8. 219 Records (above, n. 213) 143. 220 Well surveyed by Katheryn Linduff in Sackler 92-5. 221 On which see V. Curtis in Iranica Antiqua 36 (2001) 299-327; with the stud and hook at either end; and S. James in Arms and Armour (eds. M. Mode, J. Tubach) 357-92.

91

92

ABBREVIATIONS

(These are designed for the convenience of the reader, not following closely any ‘Harvard’ or other conventions.) ACSS: Ancient Civilizations from Scythia to Siberia Aruz (ed.) 2000: The Golden Deer of Eurasia (New York, Metropolitan Museum) L’Asie des Steppes: Exhibition Catalogue; Barcelona, Paris, Madrid, 2000 Barbier, Geneva: J.-P. Barbier, Art des Steppes (Musée Barbier-Mueller, Genève, 1996) Beijing 1991: Nanyue King's Tomb of the Western Han Berlin 2007: M. Wagner and H. Butz, Nomadenkunst. Ordosbronzen der Ostasiatischem Kunstsammlung, Berlin (Mainz) BLM: Jerusalem, Bible Lands Museum. Forthcoming Catalogue by U. Jaeger, S. Kansteiner. BMFEA: Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities, Stockholm Boardman 1994: J. Boardman, The Diffusion of Classical Art in Antiquity (Princeton/London) Boardman 2002: J. Boardman, The Archaeology of Nostalgia (London) Boardman 2003a: J. Boardman, ‘The Tillya Tepe gold: a closer look’ in Ancient West and East 2, 348-74

93

Boardman 2003b: J. Boardman, 'Three Monsters at Tillya Tepe' in ACSS 9.1-2, 133-146 Bunker 1970: E.C. Bunker, B. Chatwin, A.R. Farkas, Animal Style Art from East to West (New York) Bunker 1978: E.C. Bunker 'The Anecdotal Plaques of the Eastern Steppe Region' in Denwood (ed.) 1978, 121-142 Bunker 1988: E.C. Bunker, 'Lost Wax and Lost Textile', in The Beginnings of the Use of Molds and Alloys (ed. R. Madden, M.I.T.) 22-227 Bunker 1989: E.C. Bunker, 'Dangerous Scholarship', Orientations 20.6, 52-59 Bunker 1990a: E.C. Bunker, in J. Rawson and E.C. Bunker (eds.), Ancient Chinese and Ordos Bronzes (Hong Kong) Bunker 1990b: E.C. Bunker, 'Bronze Belt Ornaments from North China and Inner Mongolia', in D. von Bothmer (ed.), Glories of the Past (Shelby White and Leon Levy Collection; New York) Bunker 1991: E.C. Bunker, 'Sino-Nomadic Art: Eastern Zhou, Qin and Han Artifacts Made for Nomadic Taste', in Proceedings. International Colloquium on Chinese Art History (National Palace Museum) 569-590 Bunker 1992a: E.C. Bunker, 'Gold Belts in the Siberian Treasure of Peter the Great' in Seaman (ed.) 1992, 201-222 Bunker 1992b: E.C. Bunker, 'Significant Changes in Iconography and Technology among Ancient China's Northwestern Pastoral Neighbours from the Fourth to the First Century A.D.', Bulletin of the Asia Institute 6, 99-115 Bunker 1993: E.C. Bunker, 'Gold in the ancient Chinese world', Artibus Asiae 53.1/2, 27-50 Bunker and Ternbach 1970: E.C. Bunker and J. Ternbach, 'A Variation on the 'Lost Wax' Process', Expedition 12/3, 41-43 Bussagli 1969: M. Bussagli, Chinese Bronzes (Hamlyn, London, 1969) Croës 1993: Gisèle Croës, Maastricht Exhibition catalogue 13-21.3.1993

94

David-Weill: Bronzes des Steppes et de l'Iran. Drouot Sale, Paris 28-29 Juin 1972 Davis-Kimball 1995: J. Davis-Kimball (et al., eds.), Nomads of the Eurasian Steppes (Berkeley 1995) Davis-Kimball 2000: J. Davis-Kimball (et al., eds.), Kurgans, Ritual Sites, and Settlements. Eurasian Bronze and Iron Age (Oxford BAR Int. Series 890) Denwood (ed.) 1978: P. Denwood (ed.), Arts of the Eurasian Steppelands (London, Percival David Colloquia 7) Devlet: M.A. Devlet, Sibirskie Poyasnie Ashchurnie Plastini (Moscow) - plaques from the Minussinsk/Yenisei basin (map, 16, fig. 8) di Cosmo 2002: N. di Cosmo, Ancient China and its Enemies (Cambridge) Dittrich 1963: E. Dittrich, Das Motif des Tierkampfes in der altchinesischen Kunst (Wiesbaden) Duan Shu’an 1995: Duan Shu’an (ed.), Compendium of Chinese Bronzes (Categorised Compendium of Chinese Art vol. 16; Beijing 1995) Erickson: M.K. Hearn, Ancient Chinese Art: The Ernest Erickson Collection (Metropolitan Museum, New York 1987) Gems: Gems of China’s Cultural Relics (1993) Gazette: A. Salmony, ‘Les plaquettes de bronze de Minussinsk’, Gazette des Beaux Arts 11 (1934) 1-12 Glories: D. von Bothmer (ed.), Glories of the Past (Shelby White/Leon Levy Coll.; New York, 1990) Gold: H. Wei and C. Deydier, Ancient Chinese Gold (Arhis 2001) Hebei 1996: The Lower Capital of the Yan State. Hebei Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics Heeramaneck: (P.R.S. Moorey, E.C. Bunker et al. eds.), Ancient Bronzes, Ceramics and Seals. The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection of Ancient Near Eastern, Central Asian, and European Art (Los Angeles 1981). In the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

95

Heydt: V. Griessmaier, Sammlung Baron Eduard von der Heydt (Vienna 1996). Hong Kong 1996: Regional Cultures in China. The Culture on the Steppe Interactions: K. Boyle et al. (eds.), Ancient Interactions: east and west in Eurasia (Cambridge 2002) Janssens 2007: Ancient Bronzes from China, Ordos and the Steppes (Ben Janssens Oriental Art; Rupert Wace Ancient Art. London) Jettmar 1967: K. Jettmar, Art of the Steppes (London) Karlbeck 1955: O. Karlbeck, 'Selected Objects from Ancient Shou-Chou', BMFEA 27, 41130 Kessler 1993: A.T. Kessler, Empires Beyond the Great Wall (Los Angeles Natural History Museum) Korolkova 2006: E. Korolkova, ‘Camel Imagery in Animal Style Art’, in The golden Deer of Eurasia (edd. J. Aruz, A.Farkas,E.V. Fino, New York) 196-207. Li Xueqin 1985: Li Xueqin, Eastern Zhou and Qin Civilizations (Yale) Linduff and Rubinson 2008: K. Linduff and K.R. Rubinson (eds.), Are all warriors male? (Plymouth, AltaMira Press) Loo: A. Salmony, Sino-Siberian Art in the Collection of C.T. Loo (Paris 1933) Mayor 2000: A. Mayor, The First Fossil Hunters (Princeton) Minns 1910: E.H. Minns, 'Small Bronzes from Northern Asia', Antiquaries Journal 10, 123 Minns, Nomads: E.H. Minns, The Art of the Northern Nomads (Proceedings of the British Academy 28 (1942) 1-54) Murowchick 2002: R.E. Murowchick, 'Bronze in Ancient Yunnan', Journal of East Asian Archaeology 3.1-2, 133-192. Or des Scythes: L’Or des Scythes. Trésors de l’Ermitage. Leningrad. Brussels, 1991

96

Ortiz: G. Ortiz, The George Ortiz Collection (Berne 1996) Prüch 1998: M. Prüch, Schätze für König Zhao Mo. Das Grab von Nan Yue. Frankfurt Rawson 1978: J. Rawson, 'The Transformation and Abstraction of Animal Motifs', in Denwood (ed.) 1978, 52-73 Rawson 1980: J. Rawson, Ancient China. Art and Archaeology (British Museum) Rawson 1995: J. Rawson, Chinese Jade (British Museum) Rawson 1999: J. Rawson, ‘The Eternal Palaces of the Western Han’, Artibus Asiae 59, 558 Rawson/Bunker: J. Rawson and E.C. Bunker, Ancient Chinese and Ordos Bronzes (Hong Kong 1990). An exhibition Rostovtseff 1929: M. Rostovtseff, The Animal Style in S. Russia and China (Princeton) reprint New York 1973 Rubinson 1992: K. Rubinson, 'A Reconsideration of Pazyryk’ in Seaman (ed.) 1992, 68-76 Rudenko 1962: S.I. Rudenko, Die sibirische Sammlung Peters I (Moskau; Leningrad) Rudenko, Frozen: S.I. Rudenko, Frozen Tombs of Siberia; the Pazyryk Burials of Iron Age Horsemen (translated by M.W. Thompson; London 1970) Sackler: E.C. Bunker, Ancient Bronzes of the Eastern Eurasian Steppes (from the Arthur M. Sackler Collections) with an important Archaeological Overview by K.M. Linduff, 1898, and site bibliography, 341-343 (New York 1997) Seaman (ed.) 1992: G. Seaman (ed.), Foundations of Empire III (Los Angeles) Sinor (ed.) 1990: D. Sinor (ed.), The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia I Thaw: E.C. Bunker, J.C.Y. Watt and Zhixin Sun, Nomadic Art of the Eastern Eurasian Steppes (Eugene V. Thaw and other New York collections; Metropolitan Museum 2002) Tian and Guo (eds.) 1986: E'erduosishi qingtongqi (Ordos bronzes) (Beijing)

97

Till 2009: B. Till, ‘Ornaments of Wealth and Power’, Arts of Asia 39.2, 65-72. Tannenbaum Collection, objects in the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Tokyo 1997: Mounted Nomads of Asian Steppes - Chinese Northern Bronzes (exhibition) Traders: J.F. So and E.C. Bunker, Traders and Raiders on China's Northern Frontier (Washington 1995) Tu Cheng-Sheng 1999: 'The 'Animal Style' Revisited', in Exploring China's Past (R. Whitfield and Wang Tao, eds.; Saffron, London) 137-149 Watson 1995: W. Watson, The Arts of China to AD 900 (Yale/Pelican)

98

           

MAPS AND PLATES

 

INDEX SELECT INDEX TO PUBLICATIONS AND COLLECTIONS.

References are to page numbers [e.g.: no. 1-67 means no. 1 is on page 67] Aruz (ed.) 2000: no. 2, 27, 30, 98–59. Beikang: pp. 10, 18–9, 25, 28–9, 32, 38, 90. Berlin 2007: no. 1–67; 6–63; 15–71; 25–6–67; 46–66; 49–45; 50–37; 51–32; 52–34; 58–81; 65–77. Berlin 1965– 24a, b–66. BLM (Jerusalem): no. 5–65; 6–81; 8–37; 9–32; 11, 12–57; 20-79, 21–77; 22–81; 99–33; 101–56; 102–81; 103–65; 116–77; 117–47; 118–37; 155–79; 156–50; 157–65; 159–75; 160–76; 161–35; 164–44; 165–30; 166–55; 167-33; 169–33; 168–37; 169–51; 170–34; 178–47; 179-77; 183–39; 226–56; 231–2 –74; 237–46. Daodunzi (see Kaogu xuebao 1988. 3) David-Weill: no. 16–81; 17–67; 18–81; 21–83; 24–49; 26–46; 31–81; 32–34; 33– 4–83; 42–81; 43–67; 46–75; 47–31; 49–83; 56–65; 57–76; 58–35; 59–77; 60–83; 68–79; 69– 81; 73–79. p. 66. Devlet: fig. 1. 1. 7–81; 1. 2–3–81; 1. 4–80; 1. 5–83; 1. 10–79; 1. 11–75; 2. 5–35; 2. 6– 81; 2. 7–79; 2. 8–77; 3. 1–81; 3. 2–49; 3. 6–80; 3. 7–83; 3. 8–9–71; 4. 1, 4–67; 5. 1–3– 71; 6. 1–2, 10–13–71; 6. 5–7–81; 9–80–1; 10–83. pl. 1–7–81; 7. 20–22–81; 7. 24–79; 8–79; 9. 29–32, 34–79; 9. 39–81; 10. 33, 35, 36, 42–79; 13. 49–83. 28. 104–71; 28. 109–71; 28. 114–71; 29. 117–75; 105–8, 111–3–75. p. 72. Dittrich 1963: no. 2–47; 4–80; 7–78; 11–74; 15–81; 16–79; 18–74; 20–76; 40–82; 41– 73; 61–46; 61c–32; 64a-c–55; 65–31; 66–30; 67– 32; 67a–33; 67b, c–36; 69–57; 70–48; 70a-c–35; 71–81; 72–72; 73–33; 74–76; 88–74; 89–78; 93–66; 94–36; 90–76; 91–2–75; 96–74; 104–64; 109–57.

100

Duan Shu’an 1995: no. 88–57; 90–71; 91–72, 79; 92–71; 97–8–65; 99–45; 100, 103, 105–66; 101–65; 102–45; 106–76; 107–75; 111–34; 113–49, 50; 114–80; 115–6–57; 117–81; 118–48; 120–81; 122–79; 202–51; 209–48. Glories (Levy/White Coll. , NY): no. 47–67; 48–75; 49–46; 50–76; 51–79; 52–82; 53– 79. Heeramaneck (Los Angeles County Museum): no. 827–8–66; 834–67; 835–37; 836–32; 837–44; 838–49; 839–47; 847–47; 856–52; 875, 877–79; 878–66; 879–83; 880–75; 881–76; 882–4–81; 885–76; 886–7–77; 888–76; 890–47; 893–48. Heydt: no. 1–77; 2–79; 3–75; 4–79; 5–8–81; 10–32; 11–30; 12–32; 13–34; 14–35; 15– 46; 16–49; 18–58; 19–50; 68–81; 69–67. Hong Kong 1996: no. 145–76; 146 –77; 149–80; 150–36. Janssens 2007: no. 3–67; 16–65; 20–76; 23–79; 33–71; 34–51; 35–47; 36–37; 37–31; 51–2–54; 57–63; 63–4–63. p. 23–39. Kaogu xuebao 1988. 3 (Daodunzi): fig. 9. 1–36; 9. 2–48; 9. 3–37; 9. 4–76; 9. 5–80; 9. 6–79; 9. 7–31; 9. 8–79; 9. 9–52; 9. 11–77; 9. 12–33; 9. 13–35; 10. 6–76; 10. 8–71. Pl. 14. 1–53; 14. 2–77; 15. 1–33; 15. 4–31; 15. 5–35; 16. 2, 3–76; 16, 1–80; 17. 1–48; 17. 2–3–79; 17. 4–36; 17. 5–31; 17. 6–71; 21. 12–35 pp. 6, 18–20, 48–9, 63, 77, 79, 88. L’Asie des Steppes: no. 5–73; 6–74; 110–1–66; 112–69; 114–79; 115–34; 131b–70; 147–83. Levy/White Collection (New York; and see Glories): no. 569–47; 587–36; 618–51; 658–34. pp. 38, 46, 76, 78, 79. London, British Museum 1916. 8–3. 2–75; 1928. 12–7. 1–30; 1929. 1–16. 1–2–31; 1936. 11–18. 140–1–80. 1950. 11–16. 1–58;–16. 2–79; –16. 3–81; –16. 4–57; 16. 6–32; –16. 7–67;–16. 8–66; – 16. 9–71;–16. 12–47; – 16. 17–38;–17. 15–66;–18. 11–79. 1945. 10–17. 215–67. 1947. 7–12. 364–83; –421–66;–13. 365–79. 1973. 7–26. 89–71; –26. 90–57. pp. 31–2, 34, 39, 48, 79.

101

London, Victoria and Albert Museum M556–1936–80; M17–1948–81; M180–1951–77. p. 80. Loo: pl, 9. 16–76; 10. 5–67; 11. 4–81; 14. 1–45; 14. 3–67; 22. 4–46; 23. 1–32; 23. 2–31; 23. 3–30; 23. 4–33; 26. 4–49; 27. 2–34; 27. 3, 4–35; 27. 5–81. Nanyue, Tomb of King: pp. 26, 33, 41, 52. Or des Scythes: no. 85–77; 86–74; 88–82; 149–16; 154–74. Ortiz: no. 217–65; 218–65, 67. Prague, National Museum: pp. 76, 81. Rawson/Bunker: no. 206–66; 207–8–65; 216–75; 217–76; 218–67; 219–45; 220–50; 221–77; 222–81; 224–48; 225–35; 226–48; 227–80; 228–76; 234–39; Fig. 6–39. p. 346–35. Rostovtseff 1929: pl. 25. 2–45; 25. 3–31; 25. 6–34; 26. 2–75; 28. 3–81; 29. 1–30. Rudenko 1962 (St Petersburg): fig. 35–22. Pl. 2. 4–72; 2. 5–78; 3. 5–76; 3. 9–79; 4. 2, 3–75; 5. 1–3–74; 5. 5–76; 8. 1–78; 8. 3–4– 75; 8. 5–6–74; 8. 7–8–74; 9. 1–2–82; 9. 6–79; 12. 4–5–82; 17–74; 19. 1–74; Sackler: no. 84–63; 130–63; 136, 136. 1–71; 156–57; 189–54; 198–70; 199–65; 200– 64; 203––4–65; 218–50; 219a, b–50; 220–51; 221–67; 222–75; 223–76; 224––6–79; 227–81; 228a, b–54; 230–48; 231a, b, 232–79; 233–10, 57; 235a, b–83; 237, 238a, b, 239–81; 239–81; 241–70; 242–78; 243–76; 244–42; 248–83; 250a–83. Fig. 198–70; 199–65; 200–64; 224. 1–81; 238. 1, 2–71; 241–70; 243–76. Fig. A 31–55; 32–67; 44–65; 46–66; 53––55–69; 56–23; 57–69; 58–68; 59–61–69; 65, 66–66; 73–6; 83–66; 110, 111–36; 112–71; 118–76; 124–31; 119, 120–79; 122–35; 123–52; 125–36; 126–79; 127–77; 128–76; 131–77; 134–79; 135–76; 136–7–38; 145– 52; 146–33; 147–48; 148–67, 77. Fig. F 20–65; 25–45; 29–71. Fig. W 7–51; 16, 17–71.

102

Thaw: no. 7–16; 9–57; 17–28; 18––20–54; 22–71; 62–70; 63–65; 64–66; 65–45; 66–49; 67–36; 68–55; 69–80; 70–75; 71–71; 72–75; 73–46; 74–72; 75–55; 76–35; 77–49; 78– 75; 79–47; 80–71; 81–76; 82–4–72; 85–71; 93–67; 94–65; 95–64; 96–45; 97–66; 99– 37; 100–31; 101–67; 102–52; 103–32; 104–79; 105–78; 106–58; 107–51; 108–79; 111, 2–49; 113–81; 115–78; 116–37; 117–83; 124–83; 139–63; 154–83; 159–16; 160–39; 180–39. Fig. 17–23; 30–80; 31–6; 36–23; 40–69; 41–66; 42, 3–69; 45–78; 46, 7–79; 48–75; 49– 74; 53–77. Till 2009 (Victoria Art Gallery): no. 57–75; 60–47; 61–79; 62–50; 63–37; 64–34; 65– 55. Tokyo 1997: no. 89–27, 65; 151–63; 164–6–63; 169, 71–65; 187–8–6; 189–67; 191–65; 192–3–70; 194–6–66; 199–69; 209–44; 210–67; 211–76; 212–3–75; 214–77; 215–78; 216–70; 217–81; 218–32; 219–34; 220–35; 219–34; 220–35; 221–47; 222–52; 223–70; 224–45; 225–50; 228–51. Traders: no. 1–77; 2–76; 3–77; 6–51; 8–79; 28–67; 47–16; 48–72; 50–65; 51, 2–65; 53–70; 54–64; 55–54; 56–32; 58–39; 59a–46; 59b–45; 60–54; 61–44; 62–49; 63–36; 64–55; 65–36; 66–35; 67–75; 73–27; 78–39; 80–52; 84–6–65; 89–67; 90–65; 91–76. Fig. 20–23; 24–30; 25–69; 32–37; 52. 1–66; 56. 1–16; 71. 1–44.

103