How to identify bronze wares
Today's experts have advanced scientific instruments and can even use laser measurements.
As an ordinary bronze lover, without professional equipment, to identify the authenticity of a bronze ware, one must master the key points of bronze ware identification, namely rust color, feel and sound, pattern and style, copper quality and vessel style, in order to identify the authenticity of a bronze ware. draw more reliable conclusions.
1. Rust color
Bronze ware has been handed down for thousands of years, and there are roughly three ways: buried in the soil, dropped into the water, and handed down from generation to generation. Bronze ware dropped into water for thousands of years will be as green as melon rind, but shiny as jade; less than a thousand years old, it will be green but not shiny; bronze ware handed down before being immersed in water will be purple-brown in color, with cinnabar spots, or even other spots. raised.
Generally speaking, most of the unearthed copper wares that have been handed down to the present are unearthed copper wares. Due to the differences in copper quality and soil and water quality in different places, the rust color of unearthed bronze wares is also different. Common types include green rust, red rust, blue rust, purple embroidery, etc .
When you get a piece of copper ware, you must first look at it with your eyes. If the rust color is integrated with the body, the depth and depth are consistent, solid and even, shiny and natural, then it is a naturally occurring rust color. If the rust color floats on the utensils, green and not shiny, the surface is rusty, not moist, dazzling, it is false rust.
At this time, do further appraisal, rub your hands to heat the utensils, smell your hands with your nose, there must be a copper smell, because the thousand-year-old copper has no copper smell; you can also wash it with hot alkaline water, and the false rust will fall off. If you can't scrub it, it will fall off when you bake it with fire; or if you lick it with your tongue, if there is a salty smell, it is also a pseudo-rust.
2. Feel and sound
Weigh it by hand, if it is too light or too heavy, it will attract attention. This is all based on experience. In addition, you can tap the real object with your hands and listen to the sound. If the sound is slight and crisp, it is fine;
3. Pattern and identification
This is an important point in identifying copper ware:
The patterns of the Shang Dynasty are gorgeous and complicated, and there are many flowers all over the body;
The Western Zhou Dynasty is roughly the same as the Shang Dynasty, but tends to be simple in the later period;
The patterns of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States period are fresh and lively, full of life, while the Qin and Han Dynasties are more practical, with fewer patterns and less fineness than the previous generations.
In addition, it can also be inferred and judged from the changes in the content of decorative patterns in different eras.
As for the inscription, it can be distinguished mainly from its font:
The fonts of the Shang Dynasty are regular, the strokes are strong and generous, graceful and free and easy, and there are more elegant and beautiful wavy styles in the later period;
In the early Zhou Dynasty, the Bodang style was followed;
In the Spring and Autumn Period, there are fat body and thin body, as well as the tadpole-shaped "Li Dou Wen", and the patterned "Bird and Insect Book";
Bronze inscriptions of the Warring States Period:
Qi State's font is rectangular, but the calligraphy style is close to handwriting (generally popular vulgar style), with thick and simple strokes, and many characters have strong local colors of this period in their shape.
The bronze inscriptions of Han, Zhao, and Wei have much in common in terms of shape and writing style. The body is rectangular and well-proportioned, and the strokes are round and thin.
In the Chu State in the south, in the early and middle period of the Warring States period, the bronze inscriptions still retained to a certain extent the slender shape characteristics of the southern bronze inscriptions of the Spring and Autumn Period, and were relatively broad, with tortuous and smooth strokes. By the late Warring States period, most of the bronze inscriptions of the state of Chu had become flat. The writing surface is short and multi-curved, which appears loose and sloppy, forming a clear contrast with the bronze inscriptions of Chu State in the early and middle periods.
Most of the new and common inscriptions and measurement inscriptions in the form of "Wule Gongming" in this period were engraved with sharp tools on the surface of the bronze wares after they were cast, and most of them were carved by craftsmen. , so the shape is irregular, the strokes are as thin as awn hair, the handwriting is more scribbled, and there are more vulgar characters.
In addition to the above-mentioned features, the Bronze inscriptions of the middle and late Warring States period did not weaken in comparison with the Spring and Autumn Period, but instead strengthened. The fonts also differed from region to region, and there were also many differences in structure. In the bronze inscriptions of various countries, the old Western Zhou Dynasty and Spring and Autumn writing styles have been replaced by local folk styles at this time. It is particularly noteworthy that new pictophonetic characters proliferated in the bronze inscriptions at this stage, and a large number of borrowed characters were used in the long inscriptions.
The Qin Dynasty unified the writing and used Xiaozhuan in common.
4. Bronze quality and device style
The identification of copper is relatively simple. If you look at the bottom of the copper ware, if it is made of brass, it is a fake; In addition to remembering the type and name of the bronze wares, it is also necessary to know when the bronze wares were cast, what style of bronze wares were cast and when they were cast. For example, francium, francium is a square container, which appeared at the end of the Warring States period. If it is made according to the three generations of workmanship and rust color, it is a fake. Another example is the tripod, which has existed in all generations, but if it has a cover and is short, it is unlikely to be an item of the third generation.
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