Western Asiatic Spool-Shaped Gold Beads

Bulbous body with four stub legs, tall neck and internal strainer, tall scooped edge to the rim, loop handle to the rear; body and neck painted with geometric motifs, red paint on the base and legs. 1.16 kg, 32.3 cm



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

Artefacts from Amlash date from the late second millennium B.C. through to the Partho-Sasanian period, with most dated to the 9th and 8th centuries B.C. Zoomorphic drinking or ritual vessels are abundant in Amlash pottery and usually feature depictions of animals common to that region. Such vessels have been recovered across Mesopotamia and Anatolia, and they were known as Bibru. They were produced as ceremonial drinking vessels, dedicated to specific deities, but they might also have served as drinking vessels for the social elite and royal family members.

With frieze of robed figures in procession; supplied with a museum-quality impression. 1.16 grams, 14 mm



Ex Cotswold collection, UK, 1980-1990. Examined by Professor Wilfrid George Lambert FBA (1926-2011), historian, archaeologist, and specialist in Assyriology and Near Eastern archaeology, in the late 1980s and 1990s.

Hemispherical in profile with low ring foot, segmented sidewall with frieze of standing beasts, hatched panels; remains of lateral handle, undulating band below the rim, short C-section spout; chipped and partly absent. 344 grams, 10.6 cm



Acquired 1970s-1996. Property of a North American collector. London collection, 2016.