BaoBo Micro Classroom: Western Zhou (Bowfish) Bo Four-Eared Square Seat

"Closed museum does not close the exhibition, online to see cultural relics"

Hello everyone, welcome to Baobo Micro Classroom. Today, Bao Bojun wants to introduce to you a food container - the Western Zhou Bo Four-Ear Square Seat.

　　Excavated in 1981 in Baoji City National Cemetery Paper Fangtou Tomb No. 1, the Western Zhou Bo Four-Eared Square Seat is an artifact from the early Western Zhou Dynasty and is now in the Collection of the Baoji Bronze Ware Museum.

The vessel is composed of two parts: a dome-shaped canopy and a spherical body, with four animal-shaped ears on the abdomen, a rectangular drape under the ears of the four beasts, a cast square seat under the high circle foot, and the body is decorated with dragon patterns, animal face patterns, and paisleys as the main decorative patterns. Because the inside of the lid is cast with the inscription "Bai (Bo) Zha (Zuo) Baozun Gui", it was named the Western Zhou Bo Four-Ear square seat.

The Western Zhou Bo Four-Eared Square Seat is grand in shape and is the largest of all the guises excavated from the same tomb. It is well-cast and elegant and solemn, telling us the history of the ancient country at the same time, but also showing us the heavy food culture of the Zhou Dynasty.

country

Guoben is a small country with lost historical records. From 1974 to 1981, a large number of bronzes were excavated from the three cemeteries of Zhuyuangou, Rujiazhuang and PaperFangtou in Baoji City, and many bronzes were cast with inscriptions with the word "". After archaeologists have studied, these cemeteries show the world that there was once a "" small Fang state on both sides of the Baoji Weishui River from the early Western Zhou to the middle of the Western Zhou Dynasty.

A clan originated in the Bashu region (in and around central and eastern Sichuan Province in present-day Sichuan Province), and was divided among the Zhou royal family for following the Wu king's merchants and contributing to the Zhou royal family, and later disappeared from the world because it was destroyed or migrated.

Bo is the monarch of the country, and Bo is the title of knight. The burial site of the Bo Four-Ear Square Seat gui excavated is the earliest of the national cemeteries, and the styling characteristics of the same tomb artifacts show the style from the late Shang Dynasty to the early Western Zhou Dynasty, which indicates that the owner of the Bo Four-Ear Square Seat Gui, "Bo", may have been a political deacon in the late years of King Wen to the time of King Wu and King Cheng.

Bo four-eared square seat and the heavy food culture of the Zhou people

Most of our common gui are binaural gui, and some have no ears, but the four-eared gui is relatively rare, and the four-eared gui dating that exists today is concentrated in the early Western Zhou Dynasty. Although the number of four-eared gui is small, it is very widely distributed, and it has been found in Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Hebei, Shandong, Jiangsu and other areas ruled by the Western Zhou Dynasty. According to expert research, the four-eared gui was mainly used by the Zhou people, descendants of merchants and high-ranking nobles of other Fang countries.

In addition to the four animal ears, the high circle foot and square seat also make this artifact unique. We all know that the Zhou people blamed one of the reasons for the merchants' destruction of the country on alcoholism, so after the Zhou people gained power, they changed the custom of merchants who drank heavily. According to the classic records, the Zhou people attach great importance to diet, the Zhou people's food culture can be seen everywhere "ceremony", the so-called "the beginning of the Fu Ceremony, the beginning of the diet", and from the archaeological excavation data, the Zhou people's tomb excavations to the Ding, Gui as the representative of the food utensils occupy the central position, the number of eating utensils is not only significantly more than the wine vessels, and the types of wine vessels are also dying out, which directly proves that the Zhou people after obtaining power, the Shang Dynasty heavy wine bronze culture into a heavy eating bronze culture.

This piece of Bo four-ear square seat is the exaggerated design of the ears, feet and square seats used by the Zhou people to increase the height of the instrument, thus highlighting the position of the gui in bronze, so it can also be considered that the shape of the body of the Boxer four-ear square seat is the product of the Zhou people's heavy food culture. However, because the design of the four ears is not conducive to people's actual use, and the casting process is more complicated than the binaural ears, the four-eared guise has not really been respected, and only survived for a period of time in the early Western Zhou Dynasty, and disappeared after the middle of the Western Zhou Dynasty.

Well, the above is our brief introduction to the Four Ears square of The Western Zhou Bo today, the following is a thinking question about bronze, come and start your little brain melon, let's answer the question together!

(Answer: Ding, the ancient cooker used to cook meat, equivalent to the pot used to cook rice now)

(Answer: Gui, an ancient food container, equivalent to a large bowl used today)

(Answer: Mane, an ancient porridge cooker, equivalent to a pot used to cook rice today)

(Answer: 甗(yǎn), an ancient steamer, equivalent to a steamer today)

Resources:

Lu Liancheng, Hu Zhisheng, Baoji City Museum: Baoji National Cemetery, Cultural Relics Publishing House, October 1988;

Chen Liang: "Lectures on Treasures of Baoji Bronze Ware Museum", Northwest University Press, April 2021;

Liang Yanmin, "A Study of the Four-Eared Bronze Guise in the Western Zhou Dynasty", Jianghan Archaeology, No. 2, 2009.

Image Source:

Baoji Bronze Ware Museum; Baoji National Cemetery, Shaanxi Jinwen Integration

Editor: Ya Wang

Editor-in-charge: Cui Ruihua

Review: Li Qi