EGYPT, LATE 10TH/FIRST HALF 11TH CENTURY

A very similar lampstand was part of a Fatimid hoard excavated in Caesaria which can be dated between the end of the 10th and the first half of the 11th century. Although lacking its tray, the lampstand shows an identical structure. In their discussion of this group of pieces, Ayala Lester, Yael D. Arnon and Rachel Polak describe them with a dome-shaped base, a heavy shaft and flat tray - and of either significant height (50-60cm.) or diminutive dimensions, as ours ('The Fatimid hoard of Caesaria: a preliminary report', in Marianne Barrucand (dir.), L'Égypte fatimide, son art et son histoire, Paris, 1999, fig.3a, pp. 238-9). They illustrate the tray of another example which, like ours, is decorated with punched decoration in the form of alternated elongated and rounded cartouches (Barrucand, op.cit., fig.3b, p.239).

This lampstand can also be compared with three other pieces, all of which are more extensively engraved than ours. One with hexagonal base is in the Islamic Museum in Cairo (Gaston Wiet, Catalogue général du musée arabe du Caire, objets en cuivre, Cairo, 1984 reprint, no.8483, pl.XXV), while the others, with the circular base as found here, are in the al-Sabah Collection, Kuwait (Marilyn Jenkins (ed.), Islamic Art in the Kuwait National Museum, London, 1983, p.66) and the David Collection, Copenhagen (Kjeld von Folsach, Art from the World of Islam in the David Collection, Copenhagen, 2001, no.460, p.299).