Ritual Vessel

'Chen Zhang' fanghu. Bronze four sided fanghu, or square jar, inlaid with green malachite in a delicate pattern with much of the malachite now lost. There are two bronze ring handles held in the mouths of archaic monster masks (taotie) modelled in low relief on each side of the vessel. An ancient graffito of twenty nine characters engraved just above the base records the capture of the vessel by Chen Zhang (also known as Tian Zhang, Zhangzi, and Kuang Zhang) as booty from an attack on the state of Yan in 315 BCE.