Western Asiatic Bichrome Terracotta Dish

Broad bowl with carinated inner edge to the and chamfered rim, law basal ring; upper face glazed with floral design picked out in blue and grey, circumferential rings below the rim and panels of radiating stripes and blue glaze. 710 grams, 24.6 cm



S. Morad collection. From the collection of M. Hugues Rosset, Switzerland. Private Swiss collection, acquired from M. Hugues Rosset in 1998.

Modelled with an angular nose with straight ridge, small mouth with raised lips, rounded cheeks and chin, shallow eyes with grooved outlines, shallow ears, short neck, the back and the top of the head left roughly tooled; mounted on a custom-made display stand. 3.3 kg total, 24.3 cm high including stand



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

This finely carved calcite-alabaster head was probably unfinished, as can be seen from the absence of the holes for the inlay of the eyes and the unfinished ears. In the Arabian funerary sculptures of the period, the tops of the heads are usually cut off flat just above the hair line and left roughly tooled. The cut was due to the necessity of fitting them into niches of 'house shrines'. Large stelae with niches containing such heads were found in the Timna Cemetery.

Four lines of partial text and remains of a grid to one side. 53.8 grams, 59 mm



Specialised collection of cuneiform texts, the property of a London gentleman and housed in London before 1992. Thence by descent to family members. Examined by Professor Wilfrid George Lambert FBA (1926-2011), historian, archaeologist, and specialist in Assyriology and Near Eastern archaeology, in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This small collection is exceptional for the variety of types, including some very rare and well preserved examples.