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AN INSCRIBED OFFICIAL STONE WEIGHT FOR THE TRIBUTE TRANSPORT, CAOYUN TUOCHEN, DATED 900
奥地利
09月10日 下午5点 开拍 / 09月08日 下午3点 截止委托
拍品描述

Description

AN INSCRIBED OFFICIAL STONE WEIGHT FOR THE TRIBUTE TRANSPORT, CAOYUN TUOCHEN, DATED 900
This lot is a museum deaccession and is therefore offered without reserve

China. The weight of cylindrical form, surmounted by an arched handle at the top, and finely incised in Chinese to both sides with a date and designation.

Inscriptions:

  1. ‘3rd year of Guanghua era [corresponding to 900], Dongping country of Luozhou city’
  2. ‘The weight of the authority for the water transport of taxed goods (Caoyun tuochen)’.

Provenance: The Kienzle Family Collection, Stuttgart, Germany. Acquired between 1950 and 1985 by siblings Else (1912-2006), Reinhold (1917-2008), and Dr. Horst Kienzle (1924-2019), during their extensive travels in Asia. Subsequently inherited by Dr. Horst Kienzle and bequeathed to the Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Radevormwald, Germany. Released through museum deaccession in 2024. The Kienzle siblings were avid travelers and passionate collectors of Asian and Islamic art. During their travels, the Kienzle’s sought out and explored temples, monasteries, and markets, always trying to find the best pieces wherever they went, investing large sums of money and forging lasting relationships to ensure they could acquire them. Their fervor and success in this pursuit is not only demonstrated by their collection but further recorded in correspondences between Horst Kienzle and several noted dignitaries, businesses and individuals in Nepal and Ladakh. Their collection had gained renown by the 1970s, but the Kienzle’s stopped acquiring new pieces around 1985. Almost thirty years later, the collection was moved to the Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Radevormwald, opened by Peter Hardt in 2014. Before his death in 2019, Horst Kienzle bequeathed his entire property to Peter Hardt and legally adopted him as his son, who has been using the name Peter Kienzle-Hardt ever since.
Condition: Good condition with expected wear, signs of weathering and erosion, encrustations, small losses, chips, nicks, and scratches.

Weight: 215 kg
Dimensions: Height 59 cm

Tribute transport (Caoyun) was a vital logistical system in imperial China, responsible for transporting grain—primarily collected as tax—from the agriculturally rich southern regions to the political and military centers in the north. Spanning over two millennia, it played a central role in sustaining the imperial court, feeding capital cities, and supporting military campaigns.

Tribute transports date all the way back to the Qin dynasty, when Emperor Qin Shi Huang (259-210 BC) campaigned against the Xiongnu in the north. He transported military provisions from the Shandong coastal region to the Bei River area (present-day Wujia River in Inner Mongolia). During the Han dynasty, with the capital established in Chang’an, grain collected from the Yellow River basin was transported annually to the Guanzhong region.

Over time, the caoyun system became increasingly sophisticated. The Tang and Song dynasties expanded and maintained waterways connecting major river systems to enable efficient north-south transport. This network eventually formed the foundation of the Grand Canal , one of the most ambitious engineering feats in Chinese history.

Up until the Qing dynasty, this system remained a state priority. Governments of each era invested heavily in dredging waterways, constructing granaries, and establishing administrative institutions to manage grain collection, storage, and delivery. These efforts ensured the steady supply of food to the capital and border garrisons.

Caoyun
was not merely a transportation system, it supported the imperial economy, stabilized grain prices, enabled population growth in the north, and facilitated cultural and economic integration between regions. The system also contributed to the development of urban centers along the canals, transforming cities like Suzhou, Hangzhou, and Yangzhou into major economic hubs.

本场其它拍品

  • 竞价阶梯
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竞价区间 加价幅度
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1,600
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4,000
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8,000
1,000
16,000
2,000
40,000
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80,000
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160,000
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价格信息

拍品估价:1,000 - 2,000 欧元 起拍价格:500 欧元  买家佣金: 35.00%

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