A very famous bronze called Mao Gong Ding ( 毛公鼎 ), now kept in Taiwan, belongs to the late Western Zhou Dynasty. It bears an inscription of 497 characters, the longest ever discovered on any bronze unearthed.

Shi Qiang bronze pan vessel. Middle Western Zhou period, end of tenth century BCE. From JZhuangbai, Fufeng, Shaanxi Province.

The Shi Qiang pan vessel is in many respects the most important of all Western Zhou bronze vessels, a position attributable almost entirely to its 270-character-long inscription (see detail below), which might justly be described as the first conscious historical writing in China.