Aramaic Silver Plaque

Carved hardstone with deep sidewall, convex obverse and incised text to underside. 5.52 grams, 20 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.

Small mouth raised sharply in the middle, large nose with angular depressions for the nostrils, deep eye sockets to accept inlay, upper and lower eyelids with rounded ridges, eyebrows tapering towards the outer end; chiselled ears, top of the head cut off flat at the hair line, back of the head left roughly tooled with central vertical insertion pin; mounted on a custom-made display stand. 2.12 kg total, 18.7 cm including stand



UK collection, 1990s. Acquired on the UK art market, before 2000. Private collection, Mr M.V., a London-based businessman. 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.

Usually the heads of this typology are exhibited frontally and in symmetrical manner. Many of the heads have rather angular features. Nearly all the objects in this category were ornamented with inlay- the eyes and the eyebrows, in many cases. The sockets designed to receive the inlaid eyes are usually shaped in a rather naturalistic way.

Cylinder with standing male figure with a pair of animals to each side, restrung pair of red stone beads, old handwritten label '1647'; accompanied by a copy of an old scholarly note, typed and signed by W.G. Lambert, late Professor of Assyriology, University of Birmingham, 1970-1993, which states: 'Cylinder Seal of Cream Fossil Shell, 37 x 22 mm. In the centre stands a divine hero, nude, and gripping the neck of a horned animal on either side, each of which is being attacked by a lion with erect tail. For a terminal there stands a tall tree. This is an early Akkadian seal from Mesopotamia or West Iran, c. 2300 B.C. The symbolism comes from temple herds, which were liable to be attacked by lions at this time. They believed that certain gods and divine heroes could rescue their animals from such attacks, and by showing such scene on their seals they hoped to achieve the result be sympathetic magic.'; accompanied by a museum-quality impression. 37.6 grams, 37 mm



Armand Trampitsch, Glyptique Archéologie, Paris, Hôtel Drouot, 13-14 May 1992, no.23 [Part]. Accompanied by a copy of a scholarly note, typed and signed by Professor Wilfrid George Lambert in 1992. 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.