Full Title: Metalworking in Bronze Age China: The Lost-Wax Process
Author: Peng Peng 彭鵬
Publisher: Cambria Press, 2020
Abstract:
Metalworking in Bronze Age China is the first study that adopts a comprehensive, thorough, and interdisciplinary approach toward early Chinese lost-wax castings. It shows that the dominant belief that the lost-wax process as the optimal method for casting bronzes deserves more rigorous examination. In a broader sense, the book provides a study on the “norms,” which are seldom questioned. By examining the reasons why Chinese founders often chose not to use the lost-wax process they had clearly mastered, the book refutes the idea that lost-wax technology is the only “right way” to cast bronzes. This study demonstrates that a “norm” is in many ways an illusion that twists our comprehension of art, technology, civilization, and history.
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Chapter 1. What Is Lost-wax Casting?
Chapter 2. Metalworking in Bronze Age China
Chapter 3. Was Lost-wax Casting Used in Bronze Age China?
Chapter 4. Further Confirmed Lost-wax Castings I: The Xiasi Jin
Chapter 5. Further Confirmed Lost-wax Castings II: Certain “Diatrete” Vessels and Mirrors
Chapter 6. Further Confirmed Lost-wax Castings III: Objects with “Interpenetrating” Openwork Appendages
Chapter 7. Design as the Driving Force
Chapter 8. The Origin of the Lost-wax Technique in Bronze Age China
Chapter 9. Coda: Additional Issues and Comments