NORTHERN INDIA OR CENTRAL ASIA, CIRCA 4TH/5TH CENTURY

While this silver bowl is reported to have come out of Tibet, it was most likely brought there from Central Asia by way of the trade routes. Silver vessels were highly prized during the early Tibetan kingdoms (7th-9th centuries), with some contemporary and earlier examples imported from Central Asian regions and influencing others of superb quality that were locally produced; cf. a Tibetan parcel gilt silver bowl sold at Christie's New York, 19 September 2001, lot 130. While the subject matter clearly originates in the Greco-Roman world, indicative of post-Gandharan influence, the fluid linear style of the figures and scrollwork seems to point to India. Stylistically it may be related to a Gupta silver dish at the Cleveland Museum of Art, with similar linear treatment of the figures, see P. Pal, The Ideal Image. The Gupta Sculptural Tradition and Its Influence, 1978, cat. no. 11; and to a silver bowl from the Oxus Treasure decorated with five roundels of male busts with gilt backgrounds over a ground of fluid scrollwork, attributed to Northern India in the first half of the 7th century, see O.M. Dalton, The Treasure of the Oxus with other Examples of Early Oriental Metal-Work, 1926, cat. no. 205, p. 59f.