国立情報学研究所 - ディジタル・シルクロード・プロジェクト
『東洋文庫所蔵』貴重書デジタルアーカイブ

we find an outward-turned head, heraldically stylised, to which have been added
antilope-horns to what is otherwise a ram's head. No part of any of the bodies
is free of decoration. The artist has deliberately given up the representation
of a scene, and has made it impossible by confusing details so that they form
parts of different animals. When this tendency grows even more pronounced
we have certainly passed into the T'ang period. Plate XXIII no. 4 shows us
the acme of confused composition. Lines seem to move haphazardly in various
directions and new decorations are formed seemingly by accident. In a plaited
frame we find, aiming in a horizontal direction, two profiled heads of some
uncertain type of soliped, that meet in about the middle of the plaque. The
forelegs are at the centre and the same arrangement is repeated behind them.
Four tigers move in the opposite direction, their heads and hind legs are
arranged as in Plate XXIII no. 3. It is impossible to connect all the spiral and
striped ribbons with animal-forms. Altogether the animal-combat has become
a baroque motive which here certainly passes the T'ang period. It was later on
adopted by the Steppe people who used this form of ornamentation in a new
and personal way.
After 1000, at the close of barbarian art in the north of China, we come across
unexpected animal combinations. The frog seen from above with the four legs
touching the sides, is only otherwise found in the art of the Ural, that is to say
in the Steppe circle, in a phase that comes already after the middle of the I
millennium (9). At the Chinese frontier this type has the frame replaced by two
giant lizard-forms that attack a frog (Plate XXIII no. 5). They are apparently
a species of agama frequently found in the southern and eastern Steppes. The
impression that we are looking down upon the scene is faithfully produced,
and we cannot see their short legs. The spinal crest and the drawing of the skin
seems well observed as is the head and shield-like nose. The forelegs of the
frog are broken. This piece is shaped like many plaques and the drawing although
primitive, is easily understood. It gives at the same time a natural and a stylised
impression. Even in such late art it is easy to follow the different stages in
artistic formation. As is shown by Plate XXIII no. 6, the artist has altered the
dead frog and its aggressors into a decorative arrangement. Only two agamas
bite their prey, the other two are placed at either side of the head. Had we not
the preceding example from the Loo collection with which to help us find a zoo-
logical determination, we might consider the four encircling reptiles as snakes.
To the group of unframed animal-combat scenes, we must add another which
might easily have served as an applique but not as a fastener (Plate XXIII no. 7).
In this group we find two animals standing on a small bar. They might be of
the same species if the attacking animal had not claws and the other hooves.
We may presume that they are a tiger and a boar. The modeling suggests a date
around 500.