Pair Of Cast Bronze Cranes. Incense Holder Or Candlestick. China Qing Or Ming Period.

Pair of cast bronze cranes. The birds are fixed on rectangular bases, they carry a vase on their back and a ball in their beak. Sometimes these birds hold in their beak a flowering stem which ends in a candle holder, but here, examination with a magnifying glass reveals neither fracture nor grinding, it would seem that they are simply balls. Is this related to the funerary practice of placing a ball in the mouth of the deceased?A scholar must surely know what it is. Similarly, the vases are not hollowed out, which prevents the possibility of inserting incense sticks into them; they only have a decorative function. The cranes have an unusually fierce expression, the workmanship is rustic, the casting of the bronze has imperfections, and the chasing is weak. The patina is old. The bases are filled with lead to weight the birds and make them more stable. On the base you can see ferrous oxide stains because the inside of the legs is reinforced with iron rods, this is not a restoration but originally designed for the strength of the legs. Despite the rusticity (or thanks to it) there emerges a peaceful force from these 2 small statuettes. The vases were separated and resoldered with tin. Probably Chinese work from the Qing period or much earlier. Height: 17cm.