This article reexamines the inscription on the ▶(女/受) ding, a bronze vessel dated to the late Early Western Zhou or the early Middle Western Zhou period. Combining graph analysis, comparison with parallel bronze inscriptions, and contextual interpretation, it reassesses previous readings and interpretations while clarifying the inscription’s structural organization and historical significance. Although earlier scholarship has provided detailed philological studies and historical discussions, disagreement persists regarding several expressions, their syntactic functions, and the narrative logic of the event described. Building on previous research, this study focuses on the structural relationships among the inscription’s internal components. The text presents a three-part narrative: (1) the termination of service in the Inner Palace (內宮), (2) the conferral of a new office, and (3) the casting of the vessel together with an exhortation concerning service to the lineage (宗). Taken together, these elements record a process of status transition and role reassignment in a documentary mode. The first section—“On the dingmao day, she withdrew from service in the Inner Palace; 嬀 bestowed a black robe (玄衣) upon ▶(女/受)”—records the formal conclusion of an official duty within a space associated with women and hierarchical order. The gift of the black robe should be understood not as material compensation but as a ritualized expression of rank and role transition. The second section—“The king said: ‘You shall 聿丼 and administer the bondservants of the lineage’”—raises the central interpretive problem of the inscription. Rather than treating the binome 聿丼 as a specific noun or personal name, this article interprets it as a coordinate verbal expression. Its syntactic structure corresponds to forms such as shuai jing (帥井), jing (井), and the paired construction bu ▼(聿/乂) bu jing (不▼(聿/乂)不井) attested in other bronze inscriptions. The binome therefore denotes the establishment and observance of normative standards and functions as an exhortation concerning the future performance of duties rather than a commendation of past achievements. Although women in bronze inscriptions occasionally appear in connection with economic authority, this text provides one of the earliest explicit cases in which a woman is assigned managerial responsibility over human labor (▶ (𤔔/司)宗臣妾). The final section— “Thus this treasured ding was cast; may it serve the lineage for ten thousand years” —follows a conventional dedicatory formula but acquires more specific meaning in context. The phrase shi zong (事宗) is best understood as continued service to the lineage rather than merely temple ritual service, directly linking the vessel to the newly conferred office. The vessel thus functions as a material medium that inscribes the holder’s new status and obligations within the lineage order. Taken as a whole, the inscription differs from the more familiar male-centered records of military merit or political appointment. Instead, it documents the termination of office, reassignment of duties, and reconfiguration of hierarchy within a group of aristocratic women. The relationships among the gift of the robe, the exhortative expression 聿丼, the assignment of responsibility for lineage bondservants, and the casting of the vessel form a coherent narrative sequence. The text therefore provides important evidence that aristocratic women in Western Zhou society participated directly in the management of lineage organization and dependent personnel, offering a valuable comparative case for future research on women and kinship in bronze inscriptions.
ShinJoo Kim (Tue,) studied this question.