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LOT 1081
Western Asiatic Bronze Tanged Spearhead
CIRCA 13TH-6TH CENTURY B.C.
12 1/4 in. (255 grams, 31 cm).
With leaf-shaped blade and rounded tip, pronounced medial rib and shoulder flanges, short flat-section tang.
ProvenanceAcquired 1980-2015.
Ex Abelita family collection.
See Negahban, E., Weapons from Marlik, Berlin, 1995, plate IX, no.117; Khorasani M.M., Arms and Armour from Iran. The Bronze Age to the End of the Qajar Period, Tübingen, 2006, item 283, for type.
FootnotesThe spearhead belongs to type 2 of spearheads according to the classification of Khorasani. A similar specimen was excavated by Negahban in Marlik.
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LOT 1081
Western Asiatic Bronze Tanged Spearhead
Estimate £100 - 140€120 - 160 (for guidance only)$140 - 190 (for guidance only)
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Western Asiatic Bronze Arrowhead Group
10th-9th century B.C.Sold for (Inc. bp): £117
Comprising mainly tanged arrowheads, the most of them having large elongated triangular blades and raised midrib, sharp central groove, cylindrical or squared stem for the shaft, barbed shoulders and convex sides; others with lanceolate head and rounded shoulders with long tang and foliate-section. 103 grams total, 29-68 mm
Acquired 1980-2015. Ex Abelita family collection.
The most of these arrowheads, having a lozenge-section midrib with thin blades filed sharp at the edges, are typical of the early Iron Age in Luristan. These arrowheads seem to belong to the type V, subcategory types A, C and D according to the classification of Khorasani and Negahban. In the four categories of triangular bronze arrowheads from Luristan, Marlik, and Northern Iran individuated by Negahban, subtypes C and D of type V are larger arrow or javelin heads, C with barbed shoulders and D with round shoulders. Subtype A is substantially similar to C, but smaller. Similar arrowheads are also visible in the Western Iberian and Balkan cultures in the Early Iron Age. -
Chinese and Greek Bronze Arrowhead Group
Circa 3rd century B.C.-3rd century A.D.Sold for (Inc. bp): £26
Comprising two triangular-section Greek arrowheads; a gilt triangular-section arrowhead with short tubular socket. 18.9 grams total, 24-40 mm
Acquired in the 1980s-1990s. Property of a Nottinghamshire gentleman. -
Luristan Bronze Horse Bit
9th-8th century B.C.Sold for (Inc. bp): £910
The cheekpieces formed as winged deer with horns and small ears, a circular opening to the body for the bar to pass through, two loops and studs to the reverse; the bar with looped circular terminals. 543 grams, 17.5 cm
Ex old English collection. London art market, pre 2000. Property of a Lonodon, UK, gentleman.
The most admirable horse bits ever created by man are undoubtedly those from Luristan, a province which extended along the valleys that make up the central part of the Zagros mountains. Worked in cast bronze with the lost wax process, they almost always had a rigid cannon in round or square bars which were flattened and rolled up around themselves at the ends, but their exceptional feature were the figural side bars. The local metalsmiths, in a period of time between 1200 and 700 B.C. managed to create an infinite number of typologies: horses, oxen, ibex, roosters and various mythological animals.
