CHINA ARQUEOLOGIA golden-age-chinese-archayeolog

9i
Chime of twenty-six bronze zhong bells
Height 23.6-120.4 (8 3 /8-47 3 /8), width at lower
lip 14.8 - 59.7 (5 3 A - 23 ! /2), weight 2.8 -152.8
(6Vs-^6 7 /s)
Middle Spring and Autumn Period (c. 550 BCE)
From Tomb 2 at Xiasi, Xichuan, Henan Province
Henan Museum, Zhengshou
This is the largest continuous bell-chime so far
known from the Chinese Bronze Age, 1 though other
contexts — e.g., the tomb of Marquis Yi at Leigudun,
Suixian (Hubei province) — have yielded multiple
chimes totaling larger numbers of bells. The twentysix
bells (yongzhong) were arranged on a two-tiered
wooden rack; each bell was suspended from two
ropes, connected by a bronze pin through the bell's
suspension loop. 2 To minimize acoustic interference
from the vibrating suspension ropes, the ropes
were made of lead.
Long and massive octagonal shanks counterbalance
the bell bodies; the suspension rings are
affixed laterally, causing the bells to tilt toward the
player and permitting greater accuracy in striking
than in vertically suspended bells — an important
feature, since each yongzhong can emit two notes,
depending on whether it is struck in the center
or midway to the side. (The interval between the
two notes usually approximates either a minor or
a major third.) Long forgotten and not rediscovered
until 1978, this acoustic phenomenon is caused by
the bell's almond-shaped (pointed-oval) cross section.
The inscriptions that identify the tones on
Marquis Yi's bells show that Eastern Zhou bellcasters
could determine the pitch of both tones in
advance — a skill that they must have developed
through assiduous experimentation, since the
mathematics then available did not permit casters
to calculate an exact formula for the relation between
size and pitch. 3
This chime still emits tones similar to those
heard during the Bronze Age. Its range extends over
five octaves, with up to ten different notes per octave
(sometimes, the same note can be played on
more than one bell). One can play a pentatonic
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