RARE COUPE SUR PIED EN LAQUE TIXI NOIR FIN DE LA DYNASTIE SONG DU SUD-DÉBUT DE LA DYNASTIE YUAN |

les bords au pourtour aplati et légèrement évasé reposant sur une section circulaire et aplatie émergeant d'un court pied droit arrondi, à décor intérieur et extérieur de plusieurs rangées de ruyi rayonnant autour du centre de la coupe laquée noir, révélant les couches successives de laque rouge et noir 

Formerly in a private collection, Osaka, Japan (by repute).
Formerly in the collection of Roger Weston, Chicago (by repute).

Cupstands are known to have been used from at least the late Tang dynasty onward, as a rare example made in glass from the relic deposit at Famen Temple, Baoji, Fufeng County, Shaanxi demonstrates, compare Zhongguo jin yin boli falanqi quanji, vol. 4: boliqi (1), Shijiazhuang, 2004, pl. 88 and p. 30. Excavated examples made in a variety of materials and ranging from precious silver to bronze and lacquer have been discovered in archaeological contexts of mostly Northern and Southern Song date. Compare three silver cupstands excavated from two different hoards in Inner Mongolia and Sichuan, published in The Colours and Form of Song and Yuan China. Featuring Lacquerwares, Ceramics, and Metalwares, Nezu Museum of Fine Arts, Tokyo, 2004, p. 172, fig. 14g and p. 176, figs. 29g and 19h. For plain lacquer examples of lobed or circular shape from archaeological contexts, see ibid., p. 178, fig. 31c, and p. 180, fig. 35c. The shape of cupstands appears to have been slightly modified in the late Southern Song and Yuan periods, when the circular ring supporting the cup disappeared, compare a silver cupstand of foliate shape from a hoard in Anhui province, illustrated ibid., p. 195, fig. 78k.

The present lacquer cupstand with its elaborate sword-pommel design, may have originally had a support such as other examples of this type and design illustrate, see, for example, an tixi-decorated cupstand dated to the Southern Song dynasty, from the collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, illustrated in Ancient Chinese Lacquer, Taipei, 1994, pl. 30, or a mother-of-pearl inlaid cupstand from the collection of the Nezu Museum, Tokyo, illustrated ibid., pl. 40. The only other known cupstand of the same circular form similarly without a circular support, also decorated with sword pommels, is published by Lee Yu-kuan, in Oriental Lacquer Art, New York and Tokyo, 1972, p. 132, fig. 66. Dated to the Yuan dynasty by Lee because of a Yang Mao signature on the base, it could, however, be of earlier, Southern Song date. The result of a C14 test carried out on the present, very similar cupstand offered here supports a Southern Song date of this piece.