Wine Vessel (Hu) (c. 1000–900 BCE): Art, History and Details

Wine Vessel (Hu) (c. 1000–900 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This tall, slender bronze wine vessel, called a hu, has three bands of ornamentation: one above the foot, one around the neck, and one on the cover. Stylized birds or phoenixes are in the band around the neck, while the band on the cover and foot feature geometric dragons. The dragon and the phoenix may represent yin and yang and would be equally appropriate on a bronze of either secular or religious purposes. When inverted, the cover forms a cup. It likely held liquids like wine at festive banquets or religious ceremonies. The cylindrical "handles" at the neck band suggest that the vessel was carried by a cord.

Object facts

• Title: Wine Vessel (Hu)
• Date: c. 1000–900 BCE
• Culture: China, Western Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–771 BCE)
• Type: Metalwork
• Technique: bronze
• Dimensions: Overall: 46.1 cm (18 1/8 in.); without cover: 41.7 cm (16 7/16 in.)
• Collection: China - Zhou Dynasty
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1944.61

A detail from the museum

This vessel was cast by the cire perdue, or lost wax, process.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Kümmel, Otto. Jörg Trübner zum Gedächtnis. Ergebnisse seiner letzten chinesischen Reisen. Berlin: Klinkhardt & Biermann, 1930.
• Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc., New York. Oriental Art. March 16–17, 1944. Lot 225.
• Hollis, Howard. “A Chinese Bronze Vessel.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 32, no. 7 (1945): 139–140, 143.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.