My system is not decent

The earliest description of this Guoji clan teapot can be found in Wu Yun's "Illustrated Notes on Yi Vessels of Liangjuxuan".

Wu Yunke was a famous epigrapher and collector in the Qing Dynasty, and he collected more than [-] ancient bronze wares.

His study "Two Fu Xuan" is named after a pair of important bronze pots in his collection.

Wu Yun had a good relationship with other important epigraph collectors, such as Pan Zuyin, Wu Dacheng, Chen Jieqi and Li Hongyi.

They often meet or correspond, discuss and exchange collections.

According to "Illustrated Notes on Yi Vessels of Liangyuxuan", Wu Yun gave this pot and a Ding Yi, Ligefu Ding Yi of the Shang Dynasty, to Li Hongyi.

From this point, it is not difficult to find that since the late Qing Dynasty, the pots of the Guoji family group have been cherished and respected by countless masters of gold and stone.

So this bronze ware has been handed down in an orderly manner, which is extremely important in the auction market, especially for bronze ware.

This makes it the only circulator in the market.

Therefore, another reason why this Guoji's subgroup pot has attracted much attention is because it is the only one in the market for this type of bronze wares.

Friends who are familiar with the rules of the collection market know that bronzes cannot be bought and sold in the market at will.

For the sake of protecting cultural relics, the national cultural relics department has not yet opened the bronze ware market.

In other words, our country restricts the circulation of bronze wares.

The law only allows orderly handed down bronze wares and bronze wares returned from overseas to be traded in the domestic market, and the circulation is not large.

Therefore, the normal market circulation of Guoji's subgroup pots is not only because of the orderly circulation, but also because most of the few heavy bronze vessels that can be circulated in recent years have been auctioned overseas.

According to records, it was unearthed in Fengxiang, Xishaan, in the Qing Dynasty, and it is very likely that the pot of the Guoji clan group was unearthed in the late Qianlong period.

It was successively collected by Wu Yun, Li Hongyi and Zou An (1864-1940), the master connoisseurs in the late Qing Dynasty.

From the end of the Qing Dynasty to the present, there have been more than [-] records of this pot and its inscriptions, which have been cited and studied by Chinese and foreign scholars. In recent years, there are few bronze wares that have been seen in the market.

For example, Rong Geng's "Shang Zhou Yi Qi Tong Kao" and Wu Dacheng's "Mang Zhai Ji Gu Lu".

Other records such as Wu Yun's "Illustrated Notes on the Yi Wares of Liangxuan", Wang Guowei's "Records of Jinwen in the Kingdom of the Kingdom of China", Zou An's "Zhou Jin Wencun", and "Shuangwang Jizhai Jinshi Tulu" all clearly mentioned this. pot.

The shape, ornamentation and inscriptions of the pots of the Guoji clan are very unique.

In particular, its inscription makes it an orphan, because it is impossible to reappear with the same inscription and shape.

There are seventeen characters inscribed on the inner neck of the pot of the Guoji clan: "The sons and grandchildren of the Guoji clan made a treasure pot and enjoyed it forever."

Among them, "Guo" refers to the State of Guo, "Ji" refers to the family clan, and "Zi Group" refers to the name of the person who made this vessel.

This inscription records the purpose and implication of the Ji clan of the Guo State in making this precious pot.

He definitely hopes that future generations can cherish this artifact forever.

At present, it is known that there are eight pots in the same group as Guo Ji's son.

Including three 鬲, three gui, one you and one plate, the inscriptions are all similar.

Several of them are housed in the Palace Museum, the Maritime Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

The whereabouts of several other pieces are unknown, and only rubbings survive.

It is a pity that Guo Ji's Zizu jug is the only one that can be circulated in the current market for this set of utensils.

So, apart from this Guoji pot, where are the other "Guo" bronzes hidden?Will there be more?

Also, how do the bronzes in the photos in front of you compare with the "Guoshi" bronzes?

Chen Wenzhe paid more attention to these, because he had a natural advantage in finding such treasures.

Comparing the "Guo" bronze, Chen Wenzhe carefully studied the photos in his hand.

Each of the other representative artifacts of the "Guo family" is a national treasure.

For example, the Guo Jizi Group Ge, which is from the Spring and Autumn Period and is now in the Palace Museum.

The three hollow feet are convenient for cooking and heating.

Bronze Li evolved from pottery Li, which is the cooking utensil we use for cooking.

Now used as a ritual vessel, this one has a large rim, and the body of the tripod is also decorated with dragon patterns.

There is also an inscription on the edge of the mouth, which has a similar meaning to the pot of the Guoji clan.

On the corresponding photo in his hand, there are also many bronze gilts.

Judging from the ornamentation and vague inscriptions, it should not be much worse than the "Guo" bronze 鬲.

Calculated in this way, if he buys this batch of bronze wares, will he also get a batch of treasures whose value is comparable to "Guo's" bronze?

If this is the case, the treasures of the first-level cultural relics he got this time are not just one or two.

I went through the album again, and the bronze ring in the front seems to be not simple.

Compared with the Guo Jizi group you, it seems not bad at all.

This vessel has a sloping lower abdomen, a handle on the top, a circle of fretwork around the neck of the vessel, and an animal head cast on the front and back.

Certainly not worse than "Guoshi" bronze, of course, the most famous "Guoshi" bronze must be the Guojizi Baipan, which is now in the National Museum

There are inscriptions on the inside of the Guojizibai plate, and the shape of the plate is unique, which is very similar to our current big bathtub. The plate is rectangular with rounded corners and four-curved feet.

If you don’t know what this bronze plate looks like and what its size is, you really don’t know that a bronze vessel as big as a fish tank is actually a plate?
Therefore, looking at some of the large objects on the album, Chen Wenzhe knew very well that they were bronze plates.

It is not an ordinary plate, but a treasure similar to the "Guoshi" bronze Jizi white plate.

Finding the largest, best-preserved, and clearest so-called bronze plate, Chen Wenzhe studied it carefully.

This utensil has a large mouth and a small bottom. There are two animal head ears with rings on each of the four walls of the plate.

There are many bronze wares with inscriptions and important historical status unearthed in China.

However, bronzes of the same grade unearthed from the same tomb are rare, and artifacts from the same family and different eras are even rarer.

Comparing piece by piece, Chen Wenzhe soon found some identical bronzes similar to Guo Zhonggui.

After all, they were all produced at about the same time, and they were all handed down in the same vein, so the things of the late Western Zhou Dynasty are very similar to the "Guo" bronzes.

And as long as the ranks of the princes are similar, the quality of the bronze burial objects they produce should also be similar.

Just like the bronze gui in front of me, the mouth is slightly closed, the lower edge of the mouth is decorated with a C-shaped flat eye and curved pattern, and the belly is decorated with three vertical scales.

There is a shallow groove between the two patterns, and the inner and outer sides of the ears are decorated with pearl ring patterns.

This bronze gui is definitely not inferior to the "Guo Ji" bronze gui, and the "Guo Ji" bronze gui was collected in the Nanhe Museum in the Western Zhou Dynasty.

Gui is actually a utensil used by the ancients to hold rice food, most of which have a cover.

It can only be used during sacrifices or banquets.

It often appears in conjunction with tripods, the number of tripods is odd, and the number of gui is even.