Finial in the form of a human with dragon

• 1. (Najiba Choudhury per Keith Wilson, August 1, 2017) Title changed from "Dragon and figure" to "Fitting in the form of a human with dragon"; period one changed from "Western Zhou dynasty" to "Late Shang dynasty"; period two added "Anyang"; geography changed from "China" to "China, probably Henan province, Anyang"; date changed from "ca. 11th century BCE" to "ca. 1300-ca. 1050 BCE".

  2. (Najiba Choudhury per Keith Wilson, July 25, 2018) Title changed from "Fitting in the form of a human with dragon" to "Finial in the form of a human with dragon"; added Chinese translation by JIngmin Zhang; and added the following to the description: "A human figure is presented in profile, with an overly large head and with arms bent at the elbow and with hands turning back to the shoulder. The legs, which are also bent, are treated in a summary fashion. Above the human head is a single-horned dragon, its body arching downward following the concave contour of the human figure. Curving projections and a tail lend the dragon a flamboyant appearance that contrasts with the compact abstraction of the human figure. Incised lines, some of them slanting, define the details of the dragon and the human figure. (Pencil marks [?] on edge; flaws on edges; few flaw cracks; cloudy; cinnabar adhering.)"
  

Draft catalogue entry for S1987.860; by Jenny F. So (2003)

Dragon-and-man fitting or finial
Late Shang 商 or early Western Zhou 周 period, 1100--1000 BCE
Nephrite, translucent light yellowish-green with brown discolorations
Height 8.4 cm; width 5.2 cm
Gift of Arthur M. Sackler
S1987.860

On this plaque, a large dragon with a bottle-shaped horn hovers menacingly over a human figure with knees bent in a crouched position. The dragon's silhouette bristles with hooked projections, its body as long as the human's and ending in a large curl. The crouching figure is seen in profile with broad nose, wide mouth, square jaw, and large round pupils framed by inner and outer canthi. A hooked element on top of its head may be a crest, horn, or headdress. His arms are raised in front of the chest so that his fingers rest just below the jaw (see S1987.882). A peculiar motif--a circle divided into quadrants by a cross--marks the rump. The legs end abruptly below the knee, suggesting that the lowest section, perhaps a tang for insert, might have broken off.

A large bronze knife in the Freer collection shows the same combination of a dragon with a tall crest holding the head of a crouching humanoid figure in its mouth (F1934.3). This impressive knife, linked to early Western Zhou 周 finds in northwestern China, [1] supports an early Western Zhou 周 date for the Sackler jade plaque.

Plaques with humanoid figures in a similar crouching position and rumps marked by the distinctive circular pattern form a clearly identifiable group among Shang 商 jades. Superb examples are in public and private collections (Norton Museum of Art crouching figure); they are also among the jades buried with Fu Hao 婦好. [2] They share the same curved silhouette as the bird and bird-dragon fittings discussed earlier, and some even wear the same tall crests. Their distinctive poses seem to have Neolithic precedents -- the crouching position in the figure with bird and animal from Zhaolingshan 昭陵山 (see S1987.640) and the bent arms at the chest in the standing jade figures from Lingjiatan 凌家灘.

A closely related tiger-and-man motif appears on bronze vessels from the late second millennium BCE. The most outstanding examples, like the zun 尊 from Funan 阜南, Anhui 安徽 province, or the you 卣 vessel in the shape of tiger grasping a human figure in the Sumitomo collection in Kyoto 京都, Japan, are all also closely linked with the Yangzi 揚子 river valley. [3] These excavated parallels in jade and bronze, from the third through first millennium BCE and coming predominantly from the Yangzi 揚子 valley, provide compelling evidence for the south or southeastern origin of this motif. [4] Some time toward the end of the second millennium BCE, after the motif had traveled to north China, the tiger seemed to have been replaced by the dragon. Whatever political or spiritual meaning the tiger-man motif might have had in the south became lost when it was transformed into a dragon-man motif in the north. By the tenth or ninth century BCE, the motif became overtly ornamental and enveloped by dense patterns of scrolls and ribbons (see S1987.481). Outstanding examples of this phase in their design during the Western Zhou 周 have been recovered from the cemetery of the Jin 晉 dukes at Tianma 天馬, Qucun 曲村 in southern Shanxi 山西 province, where numerous jades comparable to S1987.481 have been recovered, as well as jade plaques of human figures surmounted by two dragons on top, and whose arms seem to turn into dragons as well. [5]

Published: Alfred Salmony, Carved Jade of Ancient China (Berkeley: Gillick Press, 1938), pl. XX:3; Na Zhiliang 那志良, Zhongguo guwu tongjian 中國古物通鑒 (Taibei: Wenwen chubanshe, 1980), p. 85, fig. 101:d.

[1] Gansu sheng bowuguan wenwudui 甘肅省博物館文物隊, "Gansu Lingtai Baicaopo Xizhou mu 甘肅靈台白草坡西周墓," Kaogu xuebao 考古學報 1977.2, pp. 99--130.

[2] For Fu Hao 婦好 examples, see line drawings in Jessica Rawson, Chinese Jade from the Neolithic to the Qing (London: British Museum Press, 1995), p. 219, fig. 2a-b; Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan kaogu yanjiusuo 中國社會科學院考古研究所, Yinxu Fu Hao mu 殷墟婦好墓 (Beijing: Wenwu chubanshe, 1980), pl. 132:1--4.

[3] See Robert W. Bagley, Shang Ritual Bronzes in the Arthur M. Sackler Collections (Washington, DC: Arthur M. Sackler Foundation; Cambridge, MA: Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Harvard University, 1987), p. 272, fig. 43:3.

[4] This is also suggested by Jessica Rawson, Chinese Jade from the Neolithic to the Qing (London: British Museum Press, 1995), p. 218.

[5] See Aomen tebie xingzhengqu minzheng zongshu 澳門特別行政區民政總署, Jinhou guyu: Shanxi Jinhou mudi yuqi jingpinzhan 晉侯古玉：山西晉侯墓地玉器精品展 (Aomen: Aomen tebie xingzheng qu minzheng zongshu wenhua kangtibu, 2002), nos. 25, 49, 53, 57.

• J. Keith Wilson, Jingmin Zhang. Jades for Life and Death. .