- Museum number
- 89152
- Description
-
Dark blue or grey chalcedony cylinder seal; figure (hero or king) in heraldic combat with two confronting monsters, ancillary symbol and inscription. The figure stands facing right with torso presented frontally; he has pointed beard and hair, worn in a page-boy style, which seems to come to a peak over the forehead (perhaps a fillet over the brow), with fine striations across the crown; he is dressed in the Persian robe which falls in three groups of folds (instead of the usual two); his arms are outstretched and he grasps, to the left, the raised foreleg of a rampant, regardant, winged, human-headed bull (lamassu), and to the right, the neck of a rampant, winged, snarling leo-gryph. The bull monster has a long, square-tipped beard and its hair is bunched at the nape of the neck; its head is covered with a high, square-topped polos, one foreleg hangs down, both hind legs are on the ground and its tufted tail hangs down. The leo-gryph has mule's ears jutting forward, and a crest marked by a line passing over its head, between the ears and along the back of the neck; with one its lion's fore-claws it attacks the figure's arm and the other is pressed against the figure's body as is the talon of one hind leg; its long, hanging tail curls at the tip and its haunch muscles are well defined. Both creatures have two visible long straight wings, one positioned upwards, the other down. Above and facing to right hovers the winged bust (of Zorastrian god Ahuramazda?), similar in appearence to the personage, but with hand(s) raised; he rises from a central sun-disc or ring; the wings are short and straight, the tail feathers flare out and from each side of it emerge appendages like straight arms with forked ends looking like outstretched hands. Four lines of script are placed horizontally to the right of the scene; chipped.
- Production date
- 538BC-331BC
- Dimensions
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Diameter: 1.70 centimetres
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Height: 3.65 centimetres
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
- According to Merrillees catalogue "Proffessor Rudiger Schmidt points out (personal communication that the father's name" inscribed on this object "is also attested in Aramaic texts from Persepolis, as well as in the Elamite form 'Ir-da-da-ad-da", both referring to the Old Iranian '*Rta-data-' 'Given by Rta/Truth [the genius of the third day of the Zorastrian calendar]'. The son's name" inscribed on this object "is attested in the same form in the Bible (Esther 9:7) as Hebrew 'prshndt' (traditionally read as Parshandata). An Iranian equivalent seems not to be attested, but the name can be analysed as containing the same second element '*-data-' 'Given by', whereas the first element is unclear to Professor Schmidt who states that he is 'not prepared to speculate without reason'". The same source also states "it is rare to have different animals or monsters in 'Master of the Beasts' contests. The official heraldic combat is usually with indentical animals or monsters as on impressions from Persepolis. The bull-monster is similar to the guardian figures in gateways at Persepolis, with the same high polos and the leo-gryphs are also paralleled there. However their straight-tipped wings place them closer to earlier Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian glyptic. The mule or donkey ears also have Assyrian antecedents; they also appear in Achaemenid sculpture and jewellery. It is unusual for the personage and winged bust not to have crowns, but their hair is in the distinctive Achaemenid page-boy style".
- Bibliographic references
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Merrillees 2005 / Catalogue of the Western Asiatic seals in the British Museum: Pre-Achaemenid and Achaemenid periods (46)
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Lajard F 1847 / Introduction a l'etude du culte public et des mysteres de Mithra en Orient et en Occident (pl.L:6)
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Layard A H 1853a / Discoveries in the ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, with travels in Armenia, Kurdistan and the desert (pp.606-7)
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King 1860 / Antique Gems, the Origins, Uses and Value (p.131, no.3)
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Rawlinson H C 1865 / Bilingual readings: cuneiform and Phoenician (pp.238-9, no.X)
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Vogue M de 1868a / Mélanges d'archéologie orientale (pp.128-9, no.32)
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Vogue M de 1868b / Intailles legendes semitiques (32, pl.XV) (inscription only)
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King 1885 / A handbook of Engraved Gems (p.212, pl.II:2)
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Menant J 1886 / Recherches sur la glyptique orientale II (p.221, fig. 214)
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CIS II/I / Inscriptiones Aramaicas continens (100, pp.95-6, pl.IV)
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Ohnefalsch-Richter M 1893 / Kypros, die Babel und Homer (pl.LXXVII:11)
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Ward W H 1910 / The Seal Cylinders of Western Asia (1125)
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Galling K 1941 / Beschriftete Bildsiegel des ersten Jahrhundreds v.Chr.vornehmilch aus Syrien und Palestina (p.196, no.163)
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Unger E 1966a / OAW (pp.58, 66)
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Schmidt EF 1957a / Persepolis II: Contents of the Treasury and Other Discoveries (pls.1.5) (cf: animals or monsters)
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Ghirshman R 1964a / Fibule en Iran, collection de M. Foroughi (illus.250-1 from Throne Room, 289 from Treaury Relief) (cf: monsters)
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Black J & Green A 1992 / Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia: An Illustrated Dictionary (pp.119-20, fig.99) (cf: mule ears)
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Collon 1995a / Ancient Near Eastern Art (illust.144,149-50) (cf: mule ears)
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
2018-2019 29 Sep-18 Aug, Dresden, Stiftung Deutsches Hygiene-Museum, Shine on Me
2012 Nov, Paris, Institut du Monde Arabe, 'Arabian Nights'
1995-2005, 17 Nov-Aug, BM, G52/IRAN/6
1994 16 Jun-23 Dec, BM, G49/IRAN
- Condition
- Fair; chipped.
- Acquisition date
- 1849 (22nd June)
- Acquisition notes
- Lot 115.
- Department
- Middle East
- BM/Big number
- 89152
- Registration number
- 1849,0623.9
