cylinder seal

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Object Type
Museum number: 89704
Description: Banded brown and green jasper cylinder seal; monsters with ritual object and symbol. Two identical, winged scorpion-men stand on a ground line facing each other; they have long, square-tipped beards and page-boy hairstyles, the edges ending in serrated lines, and they wear conical caps with top knobs and horn-like projections in the front; they have scorpion bodies marked by a grid pattern, scorpion tails indicated by drill-holes, and the legs and claws of a lion, the latter indicated by double strokes; the straight wings rise obliquely with feathers singled out from an outlined central section. Between the monsters stands an incense burner with a conical cap covering a bowl-like container set on a columnar stand with a widened or circular base; the lid is secured by a chain to a band round the upper part of the column. Above the winged disc with its straight wings similar to those of the monsters; scroll-like appendages emerge each side of the tail; barrel-shaped with both of the ends cut slightly on the slant.
Cultures/periods
Production place: Made in: Asia
Materials
Technique
Dimensions: Diameter: 0.70 - 0.95 centimetres; Height: 2.80 centimetres
Curator's comments: According to Merrillees catalogue "the barrel shape of the seal suggests it was reworked from a bead".
Bibliographic references: Merrillees 2005 / Catalogue of the Western Asiatic seals in the British Museum: Pre-Achaemenid and Achaemenid periods (84); Cullimore A 1842 / Oriental Cylinders, Impressions of ancient oriental cylinders, or rolling seals of the Babylonians, Assyrians, and Medo-Persians (160); Lajard F 1847 / Introduction a l'etude du culte public et des mysteres de Mithra en Orient et en Occident (pl.XLIX:2); Jeremias A 1913 / Handbuch der altororientalischen Geisteskultur (p.222, fig.138, no.122?); Ohnefalsch-Richter M 1893 / Kypros, die Babel und Homer (fig.208 and pl.CIX:1); Ward W H 1910 / The Seal Cylinders of Western Asia (1137); Unger E 1966a / OAW (pp.58, 63, 68)
Location: Not on display
Subjects: mammal; mythical figure/creature; arachnid; vessel; religious object
Acquisition name
Acquisition date: 1841
Department: Middle East
BM/Big number: 89704
Registration number: 1841,0726.182

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