Chinese Door Lintel with Flower & Bird Motifs

Blossoms burst at both ends of this beam, with a faded painted band between.

This door lintel with flower & bird motifs is from Shanxi Province, China, and dates to the 18th century. It is carved & painted poplar. Once China slowly opened to visiting diplomats and businessmen, a trickle of antique furniture leaving the country became a flood that lasted through the 1980s, the 1990s and into the early 2000s. Horizontal carved bar with deep, curling floral and leaf forms at each end, and a flat center with traces of painted inscription. Pale, weathered gray-tan surface with remnants of dark pigment in the crevices. It is 87 inches long, 7 deep and 22 high.

Used to hold things up, now content to be admired.