Mirror with Dragons, Tigers and Bands with Beasts
- Date
-
制作年 Eastern Han dynasty−Three Kingdoms period (2ー3rd century)
- Title
- リュウコザジュウタイキョウ
- Measurements
- D. 23.2
- Materials, techniques and shape
- Bronze
- Collections
- Century Akao Collection
- Depository
- Keio Museum Commons Campus Mita
- Ref. number
- AW-CEN-000053-0000
- Designation
- 重要美術品
- License
- CC BY Images license
- Creditline
-
慶應義塾（センチュリー赤尾コレクション）
- URL
- Classification
- Art
- AI Tagging
- Button Circle Metal Fashion accessory Dishware
This ancient mirror with a dragon and a tiger facing each other around the knob was formerly designated as an Important Work of Fine Art. During the Shang dynasty (16th–11th century BC), diviners wrote the results of predictions on turtle shells and animal bones. The script they used on these so-called oracle bones developed into kanji (Chinese characters) during the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220). By the 3rd or 4th century, gold seals, earthenware, and other cultural artifacts were imported from the Asian mainland to Japan, and some of them had kanji written on them, suggesting the practice of writing was spreading to Japan around this time. Some of the ancient mirrors have inscriptions that pray for long and prosperous lives for their descendants, and it is likely that people on the Japanese archipelago adopted this culture from the mainland through encounters with Chinese writing.
Many of the patterns on ancient mirrors represent ancient Chinese views of the universe. This mirror is decorated with the Vermilion Bird of the South, the Azure Dragon of the East and the White Tiger of the West, but the fourth mythological creature of the Four Symbols, the Black Tortoise of the North is missing. In addition to these animals on the inside of the mirror, the three-legged crow representing the sun can be seen on the left, the toad representing the moon on the right, and at the top and the bottom, coins that also functioned as charms called Wu Zhu are depicted.
Description from the exhibition Catalogue "Letter-scape: Century Akao Collection, A World of Letters and Figures", Keio Museum Commons, April 2021
［釈文］池氏作竟有精神／上大山見仙人／捋芝草語吾道／此竟好可自保／倉龍白乕主除道兮／長冝子孫保二親／冝侯王富貴昌
This mirror is an example of a “beast-motif mirror,” in which mystic animals, such as a crouched dragon, decorate the inner band of concentric circles. At the same time, coiled dragons will often decorate the area around the central knob, and though some such dragons appear to have tiger-like heads, they are all generically called “coiled-dragon motifs.” Here, the outer band has a saw-tooth (zigzag) decoration, while arabesque patterns are seen along the rim.
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- Title (EN)
- Mirror with Dragons, Tigers and Bands with Beasts
Physical description
- Weights and quantities
-
Quantity 1点
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