The article presents a good argument that it is Chinese. I don't see why it shouldn't be.

"Lead isotope analysis of the bronze alloy provided indisputable evidence of the Chinese origin of the materials used in the statue."

So we definitely know that the metal came from China. I suppose it's theoretically possible the metal could have been made in China, exported elsewhere to make into the statue, but that seems like a claim that would require a LOT of evidence to make plausible.

> suppose it's theoretically possible the metal could have been made in China, exported elsewhere to make into the statue

Or the metal was made in China, made into a statue and then reworked into a slightly different one. Happens all the time that statues get melted down and the metal is reused.

> that seems like a claim that would require a LOT of evidence to make plausible

That is not the claim. The claim is that we don’t know. Direct quote from comment: “the origin of the artwork seems unclear”.

Saying “we know both the metal and the pattern the metal is in came from China” is what requires evidence. (Not extra ordinary evidence, but some. For example the stylistic analysis mentioned in the article could be that evidence easily.)

And before someone tries to psychoanalyse my opinion about the origins of this statue: i do not have an opinion.

The only thing i have strong opinions about is that the person claiming that we do know something is the one who has to provide evidence, not the person who claims we don’t know something.

That seems beyond implausible; shipping bronze half way around the world a thousand years ago would just make no sense at all. It would be _vastly_ more expensive than just sourcing it locally.

Originally it is,say, a chinesetiger … but someone not liking it and melt it down to re-sculpture it.

Lion is not native in china.

If you were an expert coder you might know why.

If you were an expert art historian, you might know more about the statue too.

Instead you just dismiss it because you don't know enough.

I'm not sure what you're trying to imply, even from the comments it's not clear.

Are you being flippant about the metal being from China but the creation (artwork) was done in Venice ?

That would be a bit strange, Venice had access to easier sources of metals than the silk road. Also why would it be a point of contention? If it came from China, cool, that's fascinating that items of this size/magnitude was transported for reasons.. Maybe a gift maybe pillaging ? But that's just speculation.

The main theory is that it actually came to Venice from the sack of Constantinople. Which would make a lot of sense: placing proof of your military power in your main square is something that people would do, and the Eastern Roman Empire probably had more regular contacts with China over the centuries.

> Which the metal came from China but the origin of the artwork seems unclear.

Even wildly famous western artwork often has unknown provenance, or only vaguely-known provenance. Furthermore art historians often see identifying details, stylizations, flaws, etc that laymen (like myself) don't. I'm happy to trust the reporting here as much as I'd trust anything from a field I don't know much about (what alternative is there, really?).

I'm happy that you're happy trusting this as much as you'd trust anything else. It doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement.

> It doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement.

You don't find many of these when looking at the past, and if you do, this should be a giant, glaring red flag. I may not be a trained art historian but I do know my historiography very well.

In fact neither one of us has a strong belief about where the piece was made.

I mean, I think pretty strongly it was made in china now. I certainly have more certainty about that than, say, the origins of the shroud of turin.