China, Tang dynasty (618–907) / 700s
Footed Platter with Design of Mythical Beasts amid Grapevines
The Cleveland Museum of Art catalogs Footed Platter with Design of Mythical Beasts amid Grapevines as silver (China, Tang dynasty (618–907) · 700s).
The footed tray, a foreign shape, is decorated with fantastic creatures frolicking among grapevines, a motif borrowed from Roman art.
A CLOSER LOOK
The museum identifies this silver as silver with gilt, incised, and chased decoration.
The museum's collection notes: Precious Sassanian and Central Asian metalwork had been imported to China as early as the 4th and 5th centuries as a result of wars and prosperous trade along the Silk Road. With the influx of foreign metalworkers to cosmopolitan Tang China, the techniques of sheet metalworking were introduced to the Chinese. This silver vessel demonstrates the effects of such east-west exchanges along the Silk Road. Its decoration with intricate gilt, incised and chased designs against a ring-punched ground is of a particularly high standard.
FOLLOW THE EVIDENCE
The Cleveland Museum of ArtFooted Platter with Design of Mythical Beasts amid GrapevinesOriginal explanation based on the sources above. Images carry their own reuse terms.