AN ACHAEMENID BANDED CARNELIAN CYLINDER SEAL

CIRCA 5TH-EARLY 4TH CENTURY B.C.

细节

AN ACHAEMENID BANDED CARNELIAN CYLINDER SEAL
Circa 5th-Early 4th Century B.C.
With a symmetrically arranged scene in two registers, the upper with an abbreviated version of the bearded god Ahuramazda facing left with one hand raised within a winged disk, here without the usual spread wings, with only the tail feathers below, shown from the waist up, wearing a tunic and crown, the god between a pair of winged bearded male sphinxes facing outwards, wearing crowns, seated with one fore-paw raised, the lower register with a kneeling bearded figure with outstretched wings, wearing a belted tunic, holding up both hands with palms spread out as if supporting the three figures of the upper register, the figure between a pair of eagles with raised sickle-shaped wings, their heads turned back, the terminal a figure of the bandy-legged Egyptian god Bes with characteristic leonine face and feather crown, standing with his hands on his thighs
24 x 12 mm

拍品专文

For other figures of Bes on Achaemenid seals see the carnelian cylinder in London, no. 5.17 in Boardman, Persia and the West, and the agate cylinder in Oxford, no. 675 in Buchanan, Catalogue of Ancient Near-Eastern Seals in the Ashmolean Museum, I. Cylinder Seals.