Untitled - Heather James Fine Art

Hu with a ChainChina, Zhou Dynasty (1122 – 256 BC)BronzeHeight: 12 1/2 in.AS780The hu is a ritual wine vessel used with other ritual vessels in temple offerings of food and wine to ancestors and placed in tombs and burialsites to honor the dead. This slender, curved, pear-shaped bottle is made of bronze. Given the relatively restrained decoration of this hu, itis therefore instead probably related to the generally more austere style found in regions of Northern China, although austerity was by nomeans incompatible with magnificence. Such large bronze vessels were also symbols of power and status. In fact, early Chinese historicaltexts state that the possession of hu vessels symbolized the authority to rule. Hu with suspension chains appeared in the 6th century BCE,apparently inspired by nomadic lifestyle. The hu is one of the last models of bronze wine vessels. These were soon to be replaced bypolychrome pottery hu that were both cheaper and more suitable for use as funerary artifacts to replace the obsolete ritual bronze vessels.