LOT 0231

Mesopotamian Alabaster Offering Dish with Lion Handle

2ND-EARLY 1ST MILLENNIUM B.C.

8 3/4 in. (698 grams, 22 cm).

An Aramean rectangular dish with sloping sides, an inward-facing goat-head at each corner; handle formed as a recumbent lion biting the rim; each beast with recessed eyes to accept inserts; ropework band to the underside.

Windermere Collection, Germany, 1960s.
American collection, Phillips, 1960s-1980s.
with Fortuna Fine Arts, 2012.
From the S.M. collection, 2012-2016.
From an important London collection, 2016.
Private collection.

Accompanied by a copy of an Art Loss Register certificate no.S00118561.
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.12164-218579.

Cf. Settgast, J.,Von Troja bis Amarna, The Norbert Schimmel Collection, Mainz, 1978, no.146, for a vessel with similar lion heads; Moorey, P.R.S., Bunker, E.C., Porada, E., and Markoe, G., Ancient Bronzes Ceramics and Seals, The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection of Ancient Near Eastern, Central Asiatic and European Art, Los Angeles, 1981, cat.1305, for similar vessel with lion head biting the rim, carved in steatite.

The Aramean civilisation produced superb specimens of vessels, in which the lion, symbol of royal power, was one of the most relevant decorative motifs. Vessels of this typology are already known from the Anatolian culture of Kültepe, the first Hittite capital, since the Middle Bronze Age. Also the culture of Ugarit (Ras Shamarra) produced cups with similar lion heads, in a period of 1500 and 1300 B.C.