| This paper takes the handscroll of Rubbings of the Wild Goose Feet-Shaped Bronze Lamps of Jianzhao in the Han Dynasty by Chen Xiaolu of Qing Dynasty as the main clue,sets the inscription,opening colophon,central images,and trailing as the framework of this discourse,to explore and expound on the history of epigraphic connoisseurship and collection,documenting,circulating,literary research and review.With which,this paper aims to unfold a historical narrative consists of the original wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamp and its rubbings,scholarship and technology,personage and events,transformations of time and mentalities,etc.The inscribed title expounds on two main components of this paper: the wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamps and the rubbings.The first chapter analyses and defines what wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamp is through its emergence and rise from the Warring States Period to the Eastern and Western Han Dynasties,from the origin of its shape and form to its rediscovery and records in the Song Dynasties.Furthermore,this chapter compares and contrasts two different methods of making rubbings: one is replicating the inscriptions and patterns by ways of directly placing the paper on the vessels,the other is mediated by the light or the drawing.At the same time,the discussion of the full-form composite rubbings includes these two aforementioned methods.The second chapter focuses on the opening colophon,which summarizes the antecedents of this lamp,in other words providing the historical narrative on the appreciation and collection of the wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamp of Jianzhao from the Western Han Dynasty before the emergence of its central images during the reigns of Qianlong,Jiaqing and Daoguang emperors of Qing Dynasty.This chapter shifts its focus from the general analysis in the previous section to the very object of the wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamps of Jianzhao in the Han Dynasty.Taking Xu Wei’s Research on the wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamp of Jianzhao in the Western Han Dynasty as a point of departure,the chapter attempts to offer an overview on the circulation and research of the Jianzhao lamp from 1785 to 1837 about the commentary and literary analysis on the bronze lamp by the epigraphic specialists from the height of the Qing Dynasty.For the third chapter,the main image,the analysis focuses on the rubbings in three sections: the inscription,the in-between model of inscription and full-form composite,and the full-form composite rubbings.In this chapter,by comparing the prototype of wild goose feet-shaped bronze lamp with full-form composite rubbings,it presents the differences in rubbing methods and modes of representations by different practitioners and periods.With which,this section chronicles the focus and stylistic transformations of epigraphic representations in different periods.The last section of this paper expands on the connoisseurship and collection of the rubbings based on its postscript.Drawing from Xu Kang’s origin of the full-form composite rubbings,the chapter investigates the two different groups of epigraphists in Zhehe and Wumen.In fact,the two regions also represent the dynamic centers of appreciation and collection of epigraphic rubbings from the Daoguang and Xianfeng reigns of the Qing Dynasty to the Republican era.Both the preface and postscript about the central image-mounted before the opening inscription or after the trailing-each epigraphic collector has left on this handscroll has extended not only its length scroll but also the reception and interpretation of the rubbing to all viewers.The paper unfolds according to the physical handscroll’s viewing progression,with the attempt to resonate with the viewer’s action and thought process in viewing the artwork.Through this “retrospective” case study,the author explores a collective endeavor among modern Chinese intellectuals in a movement of antiquarianism: circulating the rubbings of bronze wares.In more precise terms,what are the ways in which to present a bronze ware through rubbings and how rubbings(stone rubbings)open up the reception,appreciation,and research of bronze ware,so the interests in the civilization of bronze could be passed on to later generations?... |
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