Author(s)

Shiyun Wang ¹

Affiliation(s)

¹ Xi'an Academy of Fine Arts, Xi'an, 710065, Shaanxi Province, China

Corresponding Author

ABSTRACT

Sorcery flourished in the state of Chu, and the Chu people accordingly held it in high regard; the tomb-guardian beast, as a distinctively Chu funerary object of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, developed chiefly across three phases, its formal features shifting in step with the times, evolving from an early, unadorned structure consisting merely of a head-and-body section joined to a base, through a period in which craftsmanship grew increasingly refined and ornamentation increasingly elaborate, before finally returning once more to a simplified mode of presentation. Among these, the tomb-guardian beast adorned with "antlers" represents a feature unique to the Chu region, and this essay seeks to offer a brief account, in three parts, of the origins, causes, and underlying connotations of the antlered tomb-guardian beast during its period of greatest flourishing, thereby glimpsing the exclusive cultural symbolism that the ancients invested in the antlered tomb-guardian beast through the practice of "concealing ritual propriety within vessels."

KEYWORDS

CITE THIS PAPER

Shiyun Wang. A Glimpse into Antlered Tomb-Guardian Beasts against the Background of Chu Culture. Art and Performance Letters (2026). Vol. 7, No. 2, 55-62. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.23977/artpl.2026.070208.

REFERENCES

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