LOT 0261

Scythian Bronze Scale Armour Section

6TH-5TH CENTURY B.C.

6 1/4 x 4 3/4 in. (165 grams, 16 x 12 cm).

A section of scale armour coat composed of 162 overlapping tongue-shaped scales mounted onto a cloth panel, each with three holes to the top and some with one or two holes to the right for fastening onto the original leather backing.

From the private collection of a London gentleman, from his grandfather's collection formed before the early 1970s.

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.12469-231236.
This lot is accompanied by an illustrated lot declaration signed by the Head of the Antiquities Department, Dr Raffaele D’Amato.

Cf. similar scales from Egypt, dated circa 590 B.C., in the Metropolitan Museum, discovered in the palace of Apries, accession no. 09.183.7a–v; Cernenko, E.V., The Scythians 700-300 BC, Hong Kong, 1998, pp.7ff., pl.D & E; for identical scales see Полин, С.В. & Колтухов, С.Г., ‘A Scythian Burial in a mound near the S.Nadezhda in Crimea’ and Лихачёва, О.С., ‘Elements of Scythian tradition in the complex of armament of the Altai forest-steppes population, in the 6th-3rd centuries B.C.’, in Russian Academy of science, The war and the military in the Scythian-Sarmatian world, Proceedings of International Scientific Conference in tribute to the memory of A.I. Melyukova (Kagal’nik, 26–29 April 2014), pp.119-126, and pp.162-171, pl.3, p.126, fig.2, p.165.

The favourite armour of the Scythian noblemen was composed of scales, usually protecting the torso, sometimes the entire body (kataphraktoi). The Scythians found that the most efficient method was to arrange the overlapping ‘fish-scales’ as a corselet made of a number of bronze and iron plates, which then protected the wearer against sword and spear thrusts. Our scales correspond well to bronze scales found in May 1961 in an accidentally destroyed burial in a barrow, near the village of Nadezhda Sovetsky district. They were discovered together with iron scales, a Greek Corinthian helmet, fragments of an amphora, five arrowheads and fragments of an iron sword. Most of these bronze scales were oblong in shape, with a sub-rectangular upper end and a rounded lower end, but slightly bigger than our scales.