CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

57
Bronze two-sided mask
Height 53 (2O 7 /s), width 38.5 (15 Vs), weight 4.1 (9)
Late Shang Period (c. 1200-1050 BCE)
From Dayangzhou, Xin'gan, Jiangxi Province
Jiangxi Provincial Museum, Nanchang
The ever-increasing number of archaeologically
recovered objects is steadily eroding many of the
simple facts that once constituted our understanding
of the Chinese Bronze Age. It has been a commonplace,
for example, that human imagery played
only a minor role in the period, with no significant
tradition of portraiture or other human sculpture.
A recent survey of artifacts from the Shang and
Western Zhou periods, however, compiled dozens of
189 | TOMB AT DAYANCZHOU, XIN'GAN