AN ARCHAIC BRONZE RITUAL FOOD VESSEL, GUI Early Western Zhou dynastyPROPERTY FROM THE COLLECTION OF MARK S PRATT, WASHINGTON, DCAN ARCHAIC BRONZE RITUAL FOOD VESSEL, GUI Early Western Zhou dynastyThe vessel with a compressed globular form supported on a high, undecorated, splayed foot, and rising to a waisted neck flanked by a pair of loop handles issuing from ram-form masks, the handles meeting the base of the body at square pendent tabs, the shoulder cast with a narrow register within string borders containing two pairs of confronted, stylized kuilong with raised eyes against a leiwen ground, bisected by a horned animal mask in high relief at each side, all below a flared rim. 8 1/4in (21cm) width across handles西周早期 青銅夔龍紋象耳簋式爐Provenance: F. Kusaka, Shogado, Tokyo, 22 December 1958The decoration of this vessel displays the stylistic changes indicative of the beginning of the Zhou dynasty. The design prioritizes stylized animal motifs with streamlined shapes, a phenomenon that began in the late Shang period and accelerated in the early Western Zhou. René-Yvon Lefèbvre d'Argencé illustrates two very similar gui in Bronze Vessels of Ancient China in the Avery Brundage Collection, San Francisco, 1977, p. 79, no. XXXI. A stylistically related gui sold at in our London rooms, 16 May 2013, lot 411. While many early Western Zhou gui have tiered feet, the present vessel has a curving, flared foot, very similar to another example, sold in the same rooms, 14 May 2015, lot 4.