Wine Vessel (Zun)

Although the Zhou defeated the Shang, the performance of religious rites and the casting of ceremonial bronzes continued. Zhou bronze art, nevertheless, reveals the artistic sentiments of a new era. There was as much confidence in the achievements of the living as observance of ritual duties for the dead. For example, this wine vessel combines artistic imagination with a display of strength and force. Bold images of buffalo heads with protruding horns were cast onto the middle section. Together with the four notched flanges extending downward below the flaring mouth, there is an effect of overflowing energy.