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LOT 0184
Achaemenid Silver Phiale with Central Rosette
5TH CENTURY B.C.
8 1/8 in. (283 grams, 20.7 cm wide).
Squat lotiform bowl with wide everted rim, central domed mesomphalos with rosette detailing, traces of gilding.
ProvenanceEnglish private collection, formed 1940s.
Private collection, UK.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by a search certificate number no.12795-241325.
This lot has been cleared against the Art Loss Register database, and is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D'Amato.
Cf. Mahboubian, Art of Ancient Iran: Copper and Bronze, London, 1997, no.321, p.247; cf. also similar vessel in MET, inventory no.47.100.84, in Colburn, H.P., ‘Ernst Herzfeld, Joseph Upton, and the Artaxerxes Phialai’ in Metropolitan Museum Journal 55, New York, 2020, pp.113-119, fig.1.
FootnotesThis bowl is possibly part of a set of nearly identical vessels, probably used at the table of royal Satrapes. Persian governors used banquets to display their wealth and power by imitating the royal banquets. It was a greater honour for them to receive a drinking vessel such as this as a gift from the King of the Kings – establishing one’s status as a royal dinner guest. No doubt it took practice to drink adeptly from a vessel like this: however the omphalos in the base would have made it easier to hold with one hand, with the middle finger hooked inside the indentation and the thumb stretched out to grip the vessel at or near the rim.
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With frieze in three scenes: crouching gryphon with one foreleg raised above a guilloche scene-divider with a crouching ibex below; three human figures standing, the outer two wearing an ankle-length skirt with waistband, one arm bent holding a frond and, between them, a standing figure in flounced robe flanked by a squatting monkey with tail raised and a freestanding cruciform symbol; supplied with a museum-quality impression. 5.86 grams, 19 mm
From the 'S' collection, acquired 1970-1990s. The collection was seen and studied by W.G.Lambert, late Professor of Assyriology at the University of Birmingham, 1970-1993. This lot has been cleared against the Art Loss Register database, and is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D'Amato. -
Western Asiatic Bronze Seal Matrix
Late 1st millennium B.C.Sold for (Inc. bp): £98
With ribbed columnar shank and pierced lug above, underside with regardant beast; supplied with a museum-quality impression. 12.6 grams, 25 mm
From the collection of a gentleman, acquired on the London art market in the 1990s. This lot has been cleared against the Art Loss Register database, and is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D'Amato. -
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2nd-1st millennium B.C.Sold for (Inc. bp): £234
Round-section discoid body with applied pellets and a pair of horned animal heads to the rim; attachment loop to the top. 32.4 grams, 59 mm
UK private collection before 2000. Acquired on the UK art market. Private collection, London, UK. This lot has been cleared against the Art Loss Register database, and is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D'Amato.
