LOT 0172

Byzantine Porphyry Relief with Cross Surrounded by Two Birds

SOUTHERN ITALY OR CONSTANTINOPLE, 11TH CENTURY A.D.

17 1/2 in. (16 kg total, 44.5 cm including stand).

An imposing panel divided to four sections by a central cross on a stepped pedestal, the lower and upper arm with branch-like extensions; the upper quadrants with a circlet surrounding a palm tree-shaped motif; each lower quadrant with a bird in profile facing back; mounted on a custom-made display stand. [No Reserve]

Private collection, London, UK.

Accompanied by an academic report by Dr Raffaele D’Amato.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate number no.12179-221676.

Cf. Mendel, G., Catalogue des sculptures grecques, romaines et byzantines, Constantinople, 1914, nos.724 (929), vol.II, p.520; 1329 (2463), vol.III, p.537, for type.

The cross, symbol of resurrection and salvation, carried the meaning of Paradise, and a cross on a stepped base derived from that on Golgotha. The birds represented here are probably a symbol of joy of the afterlife, of paradise conceived as the locus refrigerii or refrigerium of the soul. The panel could have been part of a marble iconostasis of a Church of the Eastern Roman Empire, in Southern Italy, although the use of porphyry can suggest a Constantinopolitan provenance.