A Set of Silver and Gilt Bronze Inlaid Black Lacquered Lian-Form Cosmetic Boxes
HAN DYNASTY (202 BC – 220 AD)
漢 黑漆彩繪貼金妝奩
the set comprised of two boxes and covers, one of horseshoe form, the other a large cylindrical example. Each delicately worked to the exterior walls with silver bands alternating between friezes of cinnabar and brown lacquer painted against the black ground, and applied with hammered silver and gilt bronze beasts and birds, the cover of the cylindrical example softly domed and applied with a quatrefoil floret.
Diameter of larger 6 1/2 in., 16.5 cm.
Property from the Collection of Al and Hazel Sullivan, Prospect, Louisville
Please refer to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, acc. no. 1994.10.1a, b–.7a, b, for a group including two very similar examples.
The University of Arizona AMS Laboratory Radiocarbon Analytical Report no. AA115480 is consistent with the dating of this lot.
