The Fuyi horn

Fuyi horn, bronze wine vessel, Western Zhou cultural relic, 29 cm in height, 20.3 cm in mouth length, 9.8 cm in mouth width, unearthed in Shihegang, Xinyang County, Henan Province in 1986.

In August 1986, farmers in Shihegang Township, Xinyang City, Henan Province, found a batch of bronzes in the black mud of the river when they were building a dam on the Shihe Beach. After hearing the news, the prefecture and county cultural relics and public security departments went to investigate and collected a total of 14 bronzes. In the article "A Group of Early Western Zhou Bronze Ware Unearthed in Shihegang, Xinyang County, Henan Province", the 14 bronzes were divided into two groups, "Fuyi" and "Fuding", based on the inscriptions on the bronzes and the rust color of the bodies, and it was believed that the batch of bronzes might have been deposited in the river after the tombs were washed away by floods. Fuyi horn is one of the 10 bronzes in the "Fuyi" group. The bronzes in this group are all shiny black, and 8 of them have inscriptions. The “Fu Ding” bronze vessel group consists of four pieces, three of which bear inscriptions.

Two pieces of the Fu Yi horn were unearthed, and their shape, decoration and size are similar to those inscribed. One of them is in the collection of the Henan Museum. The vessel consists of a lid and a body. The lid is shaped like a roof ridge, with a small mouth and a half-ring button in the middle of the lid ridge. The body has a wide mouth and an arc-shaped concave middle, with two upward-rising wings on both sides, a narrow neck, a straight belly wall, and a round bottom. There are three triangular pyramid-shaped feet below, and a half-ringed animal head handle on the upper part of one foot (one foot under the handle was lost when it was unearthed, and the existing one was added later).

The body decoration can be divided into four parts: the lid, neck, belly and foot. The lid has four door ridges, which divide the decoration into two groups of four parts. The decoration of each part is almost the same - half an animal face and half a triangle pattern. On both sides of the two door ridges perpendicular to the lid button is a complete set of animal face patterns and triangle patterns. The animal face pattern is outlined by thick lines to outline the outline of the animal face's eyes, eyebrows, horns, nose and mouth. The bone ridge is carved on the thick lines with fine negative lines. Outside the thick lines are cloud-thunder ground patterns (Figure 1); there are two door ridges on the neck, both of which are hooked at the two wings of the mouth. The decorations on both sides of each door ridge form a large triangular pattern. Two small triangular patterns are decorated on both sides of the handle. The corresponding side of the handle is a raised animal head, and there are also two small triangular patterns on both sides; the three door ridges and the handle on the abdomen divide the decoration into two groups of four parts. The two parts of the decoration on both sides of the handle form a complete group of animal face patterns (Figure 2), and the two parts of the decoration on both sides of the door ridge opposite the handle form another group of animal face patterns. The animal face patterns of the two groups of decorations are the same, but a dragon pattern is added on both sides of the animal face pattern on the door ridge opposite the handle (Figure 3); the outer side of the three triangular pyramid feet is decorated with a triangular pattern; the body of the vessel is decorated with cloud-thunder ground patterns. There is a pair of twelve characters on the lid: 晨肇储用抓父乙宝尊沂即册. (Figure 4)

Figure 1 The lid of the Fuyi horn vessel

Figure 2 One side of the handle of the Fuyi horn vessel

Figure 3 One side of the animal head of the Fuyi horn vessel

Figure 4 Inscription inside the lid of the Fuyi horn vessel

The Fuyi horn vessel uses the "three-layer flower" decorative technique to decorate the vessel body, which is not only gorgeous and exquisite, but also cleverly laid out. First, the lid is ridge-shaped. In order to avoid the imbalance of the decoration due to excessive concentration in the middle of the lid, a group of triangular patterns is added to the two wings outside the two groups of animal face patterns; secondly, the upper end of the handle is a raised animal head. In order to increase the symmetry of the object and prevent the body from having a sense of weightlessness due to leaning to one side, a raised animal head is also decorated on the neck opposite the handle animal head; thirdly, although there are two groups of similar animal face patterns on the abdomen, the layout space of the decoration of the two parts of the abdomen divided by the two wing angles has changed because the width of the handle and the door edge is different. In order to make the layout of the decoration symmetrical and reasonable, a vertical dragon pattern is added on both sides of the animal face of the door edge opposite the handle of the abdomen. The design layout of these subtle details shows the ingenious conception and superb control ability of the maker.

The lid and body of Fuyi horn are decorated with door edges, and the traces of mold division on the door edges are clear, which is of great value for studying the mold division method and mold casting logic of horn and jue vessels. The outer mold of the Fuyi corner can be divided into three parts: the lid, the mouth to the belly, the bottom and the three legs. First, the lid is cast in an independent mold, and the outer mold is divided into four parts with the door edge as the center, and the mold division position is on the middle line of the door edge; second, the mouth to the belly part is divided into four parts with the three door edges and one handle as the center, and the mold division position is on the middle line of the three door edges and the handle; third, the bottom and the three legs are divided into three parts with the three legs as the center, and the mold division position is on the vertical middle line of the three legs.

The twelve characters "晨肇储用抓父乙宝尊沂即册" on the lid and body of Fuyi corner are inscribed with "晨肇储用抓父乙宝尊沂即册" (Chen Zhaozhu Yong Zha Fuyi Baozun Yi Ji Ce)", which is of great value for studying the history of the late Shang Dynasty and early Zhou Dynasty. The content of the inscription can at least indicate that "Zhaozhu"'s fiefdom or location is "Chen", "Zhaozhu" is the maker of this batch of vessels, "Zhaozhu"'s father or ancestor is "Fuyi", "Zhaozhu" is a member of the "Ji" clan, and "Zhaozhu" is the historian of the time - "Ce", etc.  The article "A Group of Early Western Zhou Bronze Wares Unearthed at Shihegang, Xinyang County, Henan Province" compares the 14 unearthed bronze wares with bronze wares from various places during the same period, and believes that the owners of this group of bronze wares had close relations with the Zhou royal family [3]. If the owners of the "Fuyi" bronze wares and the "Fuding" bronze wares were both "Zhaozhu" or belonged to the same tribe, then the "鄀" in the "Fuding" bronze wares was the fiefdom where the owner of the Fuyi horn was located.

The Fuyi horn is shiny black and has an ancient black lacquer shape, which is relatively rare among the bronze wares of the Shang and Zhou dynasties and has an excellent viewing effect. As a member of the wine vessel, the number of bronze horns handed down and unearthed is very small. The excavation of this vessel not only increased the number of horn vessels, but also its exquisite decoration and unique shape further emphasized the importance of horns in Shang and Zhou bronze wares. The inscriptions inside the Fuyi horn vessel are of great historical value. Because of this, Fuyi Jiao has been included in many books, such as "Complete Collection of Chinese Bronze Ware", "Compilation of Newly Collected Yin and Zhou Bronze Inscriptions and Vessel Images", "Collection of Recent Yin and Zhou Bronze Inscriptions, Volume 2" and "Comprehensive Mirror of Shangzhou Bronze Inscriptions". This is enough to show that Fuyi Jiao is a rare artistic masterpiece and a rare treasure.