A SILVER-INLAID CAST-IRON FANG DING AND COVER 17TH CENTURY

the body of archaistic tapering rectangular form, inlaid to each side with a large taotie mask and divided to the front and back face and at the corners by notched vertical flanges, the sides set with a pair of loop handles issuing from monster masks, all raised on four dragon-headed splayed feet, the base with an apocryphal Xuande reign mark, the angled cover similarly decorated and surmounted by a squared finial 

Museum fur Ostasiatische Kunst, Berlin, 2001-2006 (on loan).

It is rare to find vessels of this form although the inlay decoration of stylized taotie appears to have been popular and can be found on later bronzes. See three vessels from the Clague collection, included in the exhibition China's Renaissance in Bronze, Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, 1993, cat.no. 15, of gui shape, pl. 16, a ding; and pl. 17 of hu form.