cylinder seal
- Museum number
- 103335
- Description
-
Orange limestone cylinder seal; figure in combat with animal, and second animal. The personage stands facing left with torso presented frontally and his rear foot twisted slightly back; he has a long, square-tipped beard marked by striations and his hair is in a bun at the nape of the neck; he wears an unevenly 'spiked' dentate crown and is dressed in the Persian robe with extra 'ties' at the waist; he draws bow, depicted as a semi-circle with curved extremities, and aims at a confronting, rampant lion with tail curling upwards. In between the combatants, a caprid (ibex?) with beard and short, horizontal, notched horn and stubby tail, leaps to left. The mane and body of the lion and the neck of the caprid are marked by fine straitions, thicker striations mark the body of the caprid, and the musculature of the two animals is defined by linear and 'step-ladder' markings along the necks and shoulders; the paws of the lion are shown by double short strokes and its muzzle and eye are emphasized by small gouged hollows.
- Dimensions
-
Diameter: 1 centimetres
-
Height: 2.45 centimetres
- Curator's comments
- According to Merrillees catalogue "a limestone cylinder from the 'Ville Royal' at Susa dated to the Achaemenid period, has very much the same type of design and style, but more elaborate, with a double-tier arrangement, ... the personage is particularly close and Amiet likens the tasselled quiver with those of the guards from glazed tiles at Susa and the Persepolis reliefs".
Cf. L Delaporte, 'Musée du Louvre, Catalogue des cylindres orientaux II. Acquisitions', Paris 1920-1923, p.175, pl.91:28 A789.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1911
- Department
- Middle East
- BM/Big number
- 103335
- Registration number
- 1911,0408.25
