Wine Vessel (Hu)
c. 1000–900 BCE
- Medium
- bronze
- Classification
- Metalwork
- Dimensions
- Overall: 46.1 cm (18 1/8 in.); without cover: 41.7 cm (16 7/16 in.)
- Culture
- China, Western Zhou dynasty (c. 1046–771 BCE)
- Museum
- Cleveland Museum of Art, Chinese Art
- Credit line
- Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Teens profiles and older: its subject is for older viewers (war, death, the Passion, drink or the like). How works are placed
View at the Cleveland Museum of Art
About this work
This tall, slender bronze wine vessel, called a hu, has three bands of ornamentation: one above the foot, one around the neck, and one on the cover. Stylized birds or phoenixes are in the band around the neck, while the band on the cover and foot feature geometric dragons. The dragon and the phoenix may represent the Yin and Yang and would be equally appropriate on a bronze of either secular or religious purposes. When inverted, the cover forms a cup. It likely held liquids like wine at festive banquets or religious ceremonies.
