The Ju Fu Xin You, An inscribed archaic bronze ritual wine vessel and cover, Western Zhou dynasty

Old Japanese Collection, assembled in the 1980s (by repute).

My Gallery, Hong Kong, early 2000s.

In the late Shang dynasty, Ju was a powerful clan residing mostly in Henan and Shandong provinces. Members of the clan held important official positions under the Shang king. One such official was Xiaozi X, the owner of a bronze gui, sold in our New York rooms, 17th March 2021, lot 193. The inscription of the gui documents the famous historical event of the military campaign against Yifang launched by Di Xin, the last king of the Shang empire. Xiaozi X was one of the military generals who directly participated in this campaign. The Ju clan was active until at least the middle Western Zhou dynasty, and members of the clan continued to serve at the Zhou court. According to archeological findings, the residing regions of the Ju clan in the Western Zhou period was concentrated at Liulihe near Beijing, which is likely a consequence of the relocation policy for the Shang aristocrats introduced by the early Zhou rulers (see He Jingcheng, Shangzhou qingtongqi zushi mingwen yanjiu [Study of the clan pictograms on the bronzes from the Shang and Zhou dynasties], Jinan, 2009, pp 90-99).

A few bronzes of different forms inscribed with the same name as the present piece are recorded. Compare the lid of the Ju Fu Xin You in the Palace Museum, Beijing, cast with patterns closely related to this pan, but lacking the high-relief animal masks, included in Yan Yiping, Jinwen Zongji / Corpus of Bronze Inscriptions, Taipei, 1983, no. 5171; and the Ju Fu Xin Pan from the collection of Albert Y.P. and Sara K.S. Lee, sold in our New York rooms, 20th September 2022, lot 8.