A turquoise-inlaid bronze plaque, Early Shang dynasty, Erlitou culture | 商初 二里頭文化 銅鑲綠松石獸面紋牌

Acquired in Hong Kong in 1995.

來源：

1995年得於香港

Turquoise-inlaid plaques from the Erlitou period, which is often identified with the Xia dynasty, are rare and represent some of the earliest inlaid decorated works of art in Chinese history. The small group that the present example belongs to are all intricately decorated with hundreds of pieces of turquoise in the form of a taotie mask. Here the body is approximately rectangular, curving inward at the middle.

Plaques such as the present were clearly among the most important pieces selected to accompany the owner to the afterlife and have been found on the chests of high status tomb owners. Two examples excavated at Yanshi County, Henan Province in 1981 and 1984 are illustrated in Zhongguo wenwu jinghua dacidian, Shanghai, 1996, pl. 7, and Gems of China's Cultural Relics, Beijing, 1992, pl. 87, respectively. See also three closely related examples, formerly in the Winthrop Collection, now in the Harvard Art Museum (accession nos 1943.52.44, 1943.52.45 and 1943.52.46).

The only other Erlitou turquoise-inlaid plaque to appear at auction, exhibited by Eskenazi, Inlaid Bronze and Related Material from Pre-Tang China, London, 1991, cat. no. 68, was sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 3rd June 2015, lot 3201.