Bactrian Bronze Axehead

3RD-2ND MILLENNIUM B.C.

4 1/8 in. (227 grams, 10.6 cm).

With curved flaring cutting edge, characteristic curving shape and narrow socket, blade end squaring off, shaft hole pierced on both sides.

Provenance

Acquired in the mid 1980s-1990s.
Private collection, Switzerland, thence by descent.
Private collection, since the late 1990s.

Literature

Cf. Gernez, G., L’armament en métal au Proche et Moyen-Orient: des origines a 1750 av. J.C., Paris, 2007, fig.2.15, type H2.Ia1, for the type.

Footnotes

These collared axes have the specific feature of being equipped with variously shaped rear extensions. The provenance of this typology is clearer than others: these axes came from Margiana and southern Bactria. Gonur Depe and Susa yielded a rather atypical and probably imported example. P. Amiet suggests that they were an adoption of Elamite material, from conceptual and institutional models. They would have developed from the end of the 3rd and the beginning of the 2nd millennium B.C.

CONDITION

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LOT 0332