MESOPOTAMIA OR POSSIBLY KHORASSAN, 8TH/9TH CENTURY

Details

AN EARLY ISLAMIC BRONZE EWER
MESOPOTAMIA OR POSSIBLY KHORASSAN, 8TH/9TH CENTURY
The drop-shaped faceted body rising from spreading foot, the narrow neck flaring to the everted mouth with two pronounced stylised leaf-motifs, the S-shaped handle with thumbpiece in the form of a flaring palmette, the body plain, rim around the neck with engraved diagonal lines, light engraving around the mouth, the thumbpiece re-glued and slightly loose
11 5/8in. (29.5cm.) high

Special notice

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Lot Essay

The form of this unusually small ewer is similar to that of the well-known Tiflis ewer that is dated 686-7 or 688-9 AD (Eva Baer, Metalwork in Medieval Islamic Art, New York, 1983, pl.166, p.192; A. S. Melikian-Chirvani, Islamic Metalwork of the Iranian World, London, 1982, p.25 and note 22, p.37). The faceting found here is unusual. While the Tiflis ewer is faceted it just has narrow vertical facets. The pattern of faceting here is closer to that found on a ewer that has been attributed to the Eastern Iranian World and a date of the 10th-11th century in the Victoria and Albert Museum (Melikian-Chirvani, op. cit., no.6, pp.45-6).

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