General Description Of The Auspicious Bronze Sculpture

By Author: ada red
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The crane with lucid ganoderma and turtle is a miniature of the court mascot in Ming Dynasty. It consists of a crane and a tortoise with the former standing on the back of the latter. According to Chinese legends, the bronze crane signifies ever green while the tortoise signifies longevity that restores youth in the aged. On the one hand this auspicious bronze implies longevity and one the other it suggests love with the crane as female and the tortoise as male.
Chunhua ding is a cultural relic of the Western Zhou Dynasty, largest and most important round tripod among the bronze dings of Western Zhou. The original one is resurrected in 1979 Chunhua Shijiayuan, Chunhua County of Xianyang City, and now collected in the Shaanxi History Museum. This original bronze sculpture is 122cm high and 226kg with the diameter of 83cm. Its unique style is that there are 3 ears on its body. The mouth rim is flat where two erect handles standing decorated with kui (a sort of dragon) pattern.
This bronze shapes in wide body, low belly and three cylinder-feet with three semi-circular large ears corresponding to the three feet. On the belly are three animal masks and under each one of them is an ox-head in relief. Besides, there are also animal mask in relief engraved on each of the feet. This bronze sculpture is simple and honest in modeling and vivid in shape and weird and solemn in decorations. More importantly, it is significant material to learn the distribution of the people in early Zhou and their bronze statue casting technique.
Yu Ding is a replica of food vessel of Zhou Dynasty. It is said this particular chinese bronze was unearthed in Qishan County of Shaanxi Province. The most important of this bronze statue are the 207 words carved inside the belly of the ding, which recorded the wars and expeditions of the Zhou Dynasty.
The original is the bronze dragon ware of Late Western Dynasty. In late years in Daoguang reign, it was unearthed in Qishan Town, Shanxi Province. Mao Gong is the name of the caster. This bronze statue has straight ears, half-round body and short legs with animal design. As far as now, it has the longest inscription with 32 rows, 499 words in 5 paragraphs. Paragraph 1 says that the political situation was unstable; paragraph 2 says that the king of Zhou-xuan asked Maogong to govern the country; paragraph 3 says that the emperor granted rights of royalty to Maogong; paragraph 4 says the words of warning and encourage; paragraph 5 says the words of rewarding.