You wine vessel

Wine can, so-called 'Yu', inscribed. This vessel, broad and oval in section, has a bow-shaped handle attached to rings at the ends of the oval. These rings, together with free animal's heads on the long side of the oval, serve to divide the neck belt into four panels. On the lid and foot, decor belts are divided into four panels by simple flanges. The body and the cupola of the lid, interrupted only by two unsegmented flanges at the ends of the oval, constitute two large fields for the principle decor, executed in rather high, rounded relief on a bare ground, unusual in this vessel class. Two consecutive winged dragons appear in each panel of the narrow belts, those in one panel antithetically placed to those in the next. The body of the vessel displays a bodied t'ao-t'ieh, its vertically rising body and leg detached from the forcefully modeled head. The t'ao-t'ieh of the lid faces the same way as that on the body. The animal head at the end of the handle is a remarkable feature of this vessel. In general, it resembles the ordinary t'ao-t'ieh, but the horns are highly eccentric. Basically the well-known 'bottle horns', they are flattened at the top into a five-fingered leaf centered by a big eye in the same high, rounded relief as that in the animals' face. Patina green with patches of brown.