漢代的雕塑是目前高古藝術中最被低估的品種。我們稱之為漢族，也為漢人，但卻對「漢」這個偉大的時代十分陌生，像陶淵明說的”不知有漢、無論魏晉”的隔絕狀態。
這件金羽人十分著名，是Eskenazi埃斯肯納齊經手的重要精品之一。近期SACA學會介紹了最近考古發現，關於東漢阜陵王劉延的青銅辟邪作為投壺遊戲的一部分的文章，避邪背上的承器，與這件金羽人類似的一件羽人的做法相似。從而可以推測，這類托盤的羽人，也許是王族遊戲的一部分。
A GOLD-INLAID BRONZE KNEELING WINGED FIGURE WITH SOCKETS, EASTERN HAN DYNASTY, 2ND CENTURY, EXCAVATED FROM THE OUTSKIRTS OF LUOYANG IN 1987; LUOYANG MUSEUM, HENAN 東漢二世紀 鎏金銅羽人 1987年洛陽市郊出土 高15.5公分 河南洛陽博物館 LGH
參考：漢代筆記 vol.6 阜陵王劉延：安徽壽縣東漢辟邪與投壺改寫歷史，同類銅鎏金辟邪年代現確認為東漢 - New Excavation in 2017 Has Confirmed the Purpose and Dating of Bronze Bixie in Anhui Chu Cultural Museum.
Sculpture from the Han dynasty is by far the most underrated of all high art. We call ourselves Han Chinese and Han people, but we are very unfamiliar with this great era. It is like the isolation of Tao Yuanming's statement, ‘I don't know if there is a Han, regardless of Wei and Jin’.
This gold feathered figure is very famous and is one of the most important works of Eskenazi. Recently the SACA Society presented an article on a recent archaeological discovery, a bronze waixue from Liu Yan, king of Fuling in the Eastern Han dynasty, that was used as part of a pot-throwing game, with a carrier on its back similar to that used on this gold feathered figure, which is similar to that of a feathered figure. It is possible to speculate that this type of feathered figure on a tray may have been part of a royal game.
An important and exceedingly rare gold kneeling figure, Western Han dynasty | 西漢 金羽人
April 8, 10:15 PM HKT
Estimate：4,000,000 - 6,000,000 HKD
Lot Sold：25,255,000 HKD
An important and exceedingly rare gold kneeling figure,
Western Han dynasty
西漢 金羽人
10.8 cm
Provenance
A Japanese private collection, formed before World War II, by repute.
J.C. Wang, Taipei.
Eskenazi Ltd, London.
傳日本私人收藏，第二次世界大戰前
王瑞卿，台北
埃斯卡納齊，倫敦
Literature
Giuseppe Eskenazi in collaboration with Hajni Elias, A Dealer’s Hand. The Chinese Art World Through the Eyes of Giuseppe Eskenazi, London, 2012; Chinese version, Shanghai, 2015, reprint, 2017, fig. 161.
埃斯卡納齊，薛好佩整理，《中國藝術品經眼錄：埃斯卡納齊的回憶》，倫敦，2012年，中譯版，上海，2015年，2017年再版，圖161
‘Feathered Man’ Bestowing Immortality
Regina Krahl
“The Way can only be received, it cannot be given...”Having heard this precious teaching, I departed,And swiftly prepared to start off on my journey.I met the Feathered Men on the Hill of Cinnabar;I tarried in the ancient land of Immortality.
(Yuan you/Far-off Journey, anonymous, c. 2nd century BC, from Chu ci [Songs of Chu], quoted after David Hawkes, tr., The Songs of the South, Harmondsworth, 1985, pp. 195-6)
This extraordinary and unique figure is tangible corroboration of beliefs of a Daoist nature that in the Han dynasty (206 BC - AD 220) occupied a large group of scholars and adepts and engaged several of the emperors. Tales of men who had become immortal through various exercises or by taking certain drugs and had flown off to live on the Isles of the Blessed, had circulated in China already before the Han dynasty. In the Han, ideas of otherwordly beings roaming the mountains, who could communicate with spirits and with the dead, and thus were able to interfere on behalf of humans, gained enormous popularity. Immortals, who had transcended this world, were believed to be able to bestow spiritual or even physical immortality on men. The search for immortality became a serious concern at court.
The Emperors Wendi (r. 180-157 BC) and Jingdi (r. 157-141 BC) were already influenced by the Daoist leanings of the Empress Dowager Dou, consort of the former and mother of the latter, although Daoism at the time had not yet taken shape as a clearly formulated philosophy or religion (Denis Twitchett and Michael Loewe, eds, The Cambridge History of China, vol. 1: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B.C. - A.D. 220, Cambridge, 1986, p.138-9 and 694). Their successor, Han Wudi (r. 141-87 BC) developed a veritable obsession with becoming immortal and with attempts to link up with supernatural powers. Shamans, claiming to be able to make contact with beings in another world, or to possess elixirs to prolong life, donning feather capes in order to accord with the prevalent image of the immortal, were welcomed and very active at the court of Wudi.
By the Eastern Han (AD 25-220), the belief in immortals had become so common that a rational thinker like the naturalist and philosopher Wang Chong (AD 27-97) in his Lun heng [Critical essays] felt compelled to publicly denounce it. “In representing the bodies of genii one gives them a plumage, and their arms are changed into wings with which they poise in the clouds. This means an extension of their lifetime. They are believed not to die for a thousand years. These pictures are false, for they are not only false reports in the world, but also fancy pictures” (Leslie V. Wallace, ‘Betwixt and Between. Depictions of Immortals (Xian) in Eastern Han Tomb Reliefs’, Ars Orientalis, vol. 41, 2011, pp. 73-101, quote on p. 77).
Wallace states (p. 81) that “long, free-flowing hair visually separates immortals from the mortal counterparts”, who would have worn their hair tied up, usually under some kind of headdress, and describes (p. 79) as physical characteristics of immortals also “androgyny, large ears, long hair, exaggerated nonhuman facial features, tattoo-like markings, and nudity”. Besides androgyny, the characteristics perfectly describe the present figure and although it is not in the nude, it appears to be barefoot, and tattoos are probably meant to cover its face, neck, arms and the soles of its feet.
Images of hybrid figures, part human, part avian, are known already from earlier periods, and a prototype of lacquered wood, in form of a standing human being with human head, but with a beak and with claws, has been recovered from a Warring States (475-221 BC) tomb of the State of Chu, at Tianxingguan, Jingzhou in Hubei, as illustrated in He Xilin, ‘Handai yishu zhongde yuren ji qi xiangzheng yiyi [Winged beings in Han dynasty art and their symbolic meaning]’, Wenwu 2010, no. 7, p. 47, fig. 1. Representations of human figures, as seen here, dressed in feather robes or sporting wings, only subtly distinguished from ordinary mortals, are rare before the Han dynasty. In Han tombs, winged immortals are frequently seen, particularly on stone reliefs and in wall paintings, but also in the decoration of objects, often holding the herb or fungus of immortality or an immortality drug. Representations in sculptural form are surprisingly rare, but a small group of related figures of kneeling immortals, some holding objects, is known in bronze.
FIG. 1 A BRONZE KNEELING FIGURE, LATE WESTERN ZHOU - EARLY HAN DYNASTY, H. 19.5 CM; COURTESY OF DEYDIER HONG KONG LTD
圖一 西周至漢初 銅羽人 高19.5公分 圖片鳴謝：戴克成香港藝廊
One such bronze immortal with large ears and free-flowing hair, depicted kneeling and wearing a feather robe, is holding a tray like the present figure, and on the tray a jar sprouting three tall floral or herbal stems with dragon heads and lamp receptacles on top; the figure was included in the exhibitions La voie du Tao. Un autre chemin de l’être, Galeries nationales, Grand Palais, Paris, 2010, cat. no. 33, and The Art of the Warring States and Han Periods, Oriental Bronzes Ltd, Christian Deydier, London, 1991, no. 34, where it is illustrated on the catalogue cover (fig. 1). Another bronze kneeling figure with large ears and in feather robe, but empty-handed, was excavated from a late Western Han site at Nanyufeng, outside of Xi’an, Shaanxi province, and is illustrated in Zhongguo qingtongqi quanji [Complete series on Chinese bronzes], vol. 12, Beijing, 1998, pls 138-9.
FIG. 2. A GOLD-INLAID BRONZE KNEELING WINGED FIGURE WITH SOCKETS, EASTERN HAN DYNASTY, 2ND CENTURY, EXCAVATED FROM THE OUTSKIRTS OF LUOYANG IN 1987; LUOYANG MUSEUM, HENAN
圖二 東漢二世紀 鎏金銅羽人 1987年洛陽市郊出土 高15.5公分 河南洛陽博物館 LGH
A related bronze kneeling figure inlaid in gold, winged and with outsized ears, holding two sockets, was excavated from an Eastern Han tomb outside Luoyang in Henan and is now in the Luoyang Museum, published ibid., pl. 140, and was included in the exhibition Taoism and the Arts of China, The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, 2000, cat. no. 21, attributed to the 2nd century AD (fig. 2); and a gilt-bronze figure, empty-handed and with the space between the knees kept free, probably also to receive a fitting or a receptacle, is illustrated in Osaka Municipal Art Museum, ed., Kandai no bijutsu [Art of the Han dynasty], Tokyo, 1975, pl. 55.
In China, alchemical practises devoted to the making of gold had long been associated with immortality, as they were linked to attempts to find the elixir of life. “There is a very obvious and close connection between the ‘preparation of gold’, the ‘drug of immortality’ and the ‘evocation’ of the Immortals (Mircea Eliade, The Forge and the Crucible, New York, 1962 [original French ed. 1956], p. 112). The immutability of gold was certainly one of the reasons for this, as drinking gold elixirs was thought to make human organs in a similar way durable and thus to make man immortal. Under Emperor Wudi, gold was much in demand for alchemical purposes, but also seems to have been widely employed at court and by the nobility for vessels, personal ornaments, seals etc. Of course, very little of this has survived, as due to its eternal value, gold was always prone to be molten down and re-used.
The superb craftsmanship of the present figure shows that China’s goldsmiths had made rapid progress in the Han dynasty. While inlay in precious and semi-precious stones had already been practised earlier, gold filigree and granulation work probably arrived in China from the northern steppes around the early Han. A Xiongnu cemetery of the Warring States period at Aluchaideng, Hanggin Banner, Inner Mongolia, has brought to light a rare example of granulation on a pair of gold earrings, see Han Wei and Christian Deydier, Ancient Chinese Gold, Paris, 2001, pl. 117. By Han times, the techniques of filigree and granulation were practised to a very high standard already and apparently in many different regions of China. The rare extant items are mostly small personal ornaments, often miniscule pieces of jewellery, or belt buckles.
It would seem almost a requirement that an item connected to immortality must be made of gold, but no other gold figure appears to be preserved from this early period. There are, however, some peculiar miniature gold models of stoves, which may relate to the immortality obsession of the period. Emperor Han Wudi is known to have worshipped at all the major shrines, to have inaugurated new cults, and to have sacrificed at temples built for various deities and holy immortals. Sima Qian (c. 146 - c. 86 BC) reports that Han Wudi was being advised by a magician to “Sacrifice to the Furnace … and you will be able to summon (supernatural) beings; when you have called forth these beings, the powder of cinnabar can be transformed into yellow gold; when the yellow gold is produced you will be able to make of it utensils for drinking and eating and in so doing you will have a prolonged longevity. When your longevity is prolonged you will be able to see the blessed (hsien [xian])of the island of P’eng Lai which is in the midst of the seas. When you have seen them and have made the feng and chan sacrifices, then you will not die.” (Eliade, op.cit., pp. 112f.)
FIG. 3. A GOLD MODEL OF A STOVE, HAN DYNASTY, EXCAVATED FROM LUJIAKOU, WEIYANG AREA, XI’AN; COURTESY OF DEYDIER HONG KONG LTD
圖三 漢 金灶 西安未央區盧家口村出土 圖片鳴謝：戴克成香港藝廊
Wudi is recorded to have performed sacrifices to Zao Jun, the Prince of the Stove, who was believed to watch over the furnace that produced gold. One tiny such model (2.9 cm long) shows very similar granulation, and tear-shaped enclosures for jewels, some still containing turquoises, others empty and similarly showing remains of a red substance inside (fig. 3); it was excavated from Lujiakou, Weiyang area, Xi’an, is now in the Xi’an Museum, Shaanxi province, and was included in the exhibition celebrating the 70th Anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China Yu tian jiu chang. Zhou Qin Han Tang wenhua yu yishu/Everlasting like the Heavens. The Cultures and Arts of the Zhou, Qin, Han, and Tang, Shanghai, 2019, pp. 344-5, where it is attributed to the Western Han dynasty (206 BC - AD 9). Another gold model of a stove was excavated in Heshang village, Ju county, Shandong province, together with two gold plaques, one in the form of a toad, illustrated in Han and Deydier, op.cit., pls 177-9.
Our feathered immortal figure in pure gold might have been similarly used in sacrificial offerings to act as an intermediary to those feathered men who had already flown off and therefore might be able to bestow blessings or even deathlessness; or it might have been placed in a tomb to provide similar services to the deceased, since immortality was not only conceived as prolongation of life here on earth, but could also refer to spiritual eternity. Although we do not know its precise function, its extraordinary, compelling presence still casts a spell on us today.
羽人長生
康蕊君
「『道可受兮，不可傳。……』聞至貴而遂徂兮，忽乎吾將行。仍羽人於丹丘兮，留不死之舊鄉。」
〈遠遊〉，《楚辭》，約西元前二世紀，節錄於 David Hawkes 譯，《The Songs of the South》，Harmondsworth，1985年，頁195-6
金質羽人，乃存世孤品，珍稀非凡，彰顯漢代（西元前206 年 – 220年）盛行之道家思想，深遠影響數朝帝王與許多學者士人。早在漢以前，關於人類經由修練或者服藥成仙之傳說，已流傳已久。漢時，神仙思想極為風行，此非人之靈充斥山岳，可與陰界亡者交流，亦可干擾人事。仙人，若降臨人間，可賦予人類不朽之靈魂或甚至身體。因此求仙，遂成朝廷要務。
漢文帝（在位西元前180-157年）、景帝（在位157-141年），因竇太后（文帝之后，景帝之母）崇道，均深受黃老學說影響，但道家哲學及道教皆尚未成系統，Denis Twitchett 及 Michael Loewe 編，《The Cambridge History of China：1：The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221 B.C. – A.D. 220》，劍橋，1986年，頁138-9、694。漢武帝繼位，渴求長生不老與各種奇術，因而朝廷中充斥薩滿或巫，稱可通陰界，或可得永生仙丹，身著羽衣似仙人。
東漢以前，神仙信仰更盛，使得哲學家如王充（27-97年）在著作《論衡》中批之，「圖仙人之形，體生毛，臂變為翼，行於雲，則年增矣，千歲不死。此虛圖也。世有虛語，亦有虛圖。」（Leslie V. Wallace，〈Betwixt and Between. Depictions of Immortals (Xian) in Eastern Han Tomb Reliefs〉，《Ars Orientalis》，卷41，2011年，頁73-101，節錄自頁 77）。
作者述「長髮飄逸此特點，視覺上已清楚分界凡人與仙人」（頁81），因世間行夫走卒皆會束髮正冠，且仙人異相，「雄雌一體、長耳、長髮、非人面相、文身、赤身」。雄雌一體除外，其他特徵都可見於此金人，雖非赤體，然赤足，或面、脖、臂、足心皆文身。
半人半禽之圖像，遠古已有，如一件戰國時期漆木例，人面鳥喙鳥爪，出土於湖北荊州天星觀楚墓，刊載於賀西林，〈漢代藝術中的羽人及其象徵意義〉，《文物》，2010年，編號7，頁47，圖1。此圖像中人，著羽衣，若生羽翼，與常人幾乎無異，漢朝以前極為罕見。漢墓中，多見羽翼仙人圖像，尤其是浮雕石刻與畫像磚，手執仙草、靈芝或不老仙丹。作為雕塑題材，則非常稀少，惟少數跪姿仙人像，多端捧物件，以青銅造之。
參考一例青銅羽人，大耳、長髮，跪姿著羽衣，手捧托盤，一如本品，盤上置一罐，伸出三枝龍首仙花或仙草，頂為油燈口，展出於《La voie du Tao. Un autre chemin de l’être》，巴黎大皇宮國家展覽館，2010年，編號33，及《The Art of the Warring States and Han Periods》，Oriental Bronzes Ltd，戴克成，倫敦，1991年，編號34，亦刊於封面。另一例青銅跪姿羽人，亦是大耳、羽衣，但手上無物，出土於陝西西安市郊南玉豐西漢遺址，載於《中國青銅器全集》，卷12，北京，1998年，圖版138-9。
還有一件銅錯金跪人，羽翼、大耳，手持二燈座，河南洛陽城郊東漢墓出土，現藏洛陽博物館，同上註，圖版140，並展出於《Taoism and the Arts of China》，芝加哥藝術博物館，芝加哥，2000年，編號21，斷代為二世紀；另一鎏金銅，手無物，雙膝微開，或用於置入裝置或燈座，刊錄於大阪市立美術館，《漢代の美術》，東京，1975年，圖版55。
中國歷史上，煉金方術與追求長生息息相關，希求煉製不老仙丹，「煉金、長生藥、召仙，之間的連結相當密切」，Mircea Eliade，《The Forge and the Crucible》，紐約，1962年，頁112。黃金恆質不朽之特色，飲用黃金煉成之仙丹，遂希求人類肉體亦能永恆不變，長生不老。漢武帝一朝，黃金用量增加，用於煉丹、亦製作貴族器皿、首飾、印璽等，然而金質珍貴，多數早已熔作他用。
本品工藝卓絕，展現漢朝冶金技術突飛猛進，鑲嵌寶石之術可溯至前朝，纍絲、金珠或為漢初自北方草原文化傳來，參考內蒙古阿魯柴登匈奴墓，出土一對戰國時期金珠耳飾，刊於韓巍及戴克成，《Ancient Chinese Gold》，巴黎，2001年，圖版117。漢時，許多地區的金纍絲與金珠工藝已至臻善，存世者稀，多數為小型首飾與帶鉤。
自古以黃金製作與長生相關之物，似約定成俗，然現今仍存世之金像幾無，惟見寥寥金質微型爐灶，或與煉丹相關。漢武帝眾祠皆祭，亦祀新典，奉牲品於眾神諸廟，司馬遷（約西元前146 – 86 年）《史記》〈孝武本紀〉曰，「祠灶則致物，致物而丹沙可化為黃金，黃金成以為飲食器則益壽，益壽而海中蓬萊僊者可見，見之以封禪則不死」(Eliade，前述出處，頁112f)。
武帝親祀灶君，望其相助煉金，參考一微型金灶，2.9公分長，綴以與本品相類金珠，水滴形鑲嵌座，部分仍鑲有綠松石，寶石佚失處見朱色殘跡，出土於西安未央區盧家口，現藏西安博物院，曾展出於中華人民共和國進國七十周年慶祝，《與天久長：周秦漢唐文物與藝術》，上海，2019年，頁344-5，此處斷為西漢。另一件金灶，出土於山東莒縣，連同二件金牌，其一為蟾形，錄於韓巍及戴克成，前述出處，圖版177-9。
此件金質羽人，原或用於祭祀，作為人間與羽化仙人之中介，希求神仙賜福與長生。或用於墓葬，冀求亡者之身與靈能永存不朽。至今雖未知確切目的，金人依舊珍稀非凡，令人著迷不已。
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