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15A033
FOOT LAMP
Roman, c. 2nd century A.D. Terracotta. Length of sole: 10.5 cm (4.13 in) Molded terracotta lamp in the form of a right foot in an ornate sandal with a thick sole. Four leaf-shaped straps, adorned with double palmettes, meet over the arch of the foot, and a thong with an ivy leaf ornament passes between the big and second toes. The heel of the sandal is formed of three more leaf-shaped elements and a narrow strap, all decorated with rows of indented dots. The leg terminates above the ankles in a slight concavity ornamented with a ribbed rosette around the wick hole. On the back of the leg is a small comic mask whose open mouth serves as the air hole.
Parallels: Ancient Macedonia Exhibition Catalogue (Greek Ministry of Culture, Athens, 1988), p. 373, no. 338; BMC III, Q1138 bis (left foot). Handle missing, otherwise intact with exceptional detail. Very rare.
$6,500
15A034
FINGER RING
SOLD
Roman, 2nd century A.D. Gold, with glass intaglio. Outer diameter: 2.2 cm (.87 in) The simple setting is a solid hoop oval in section, expanding at the shoulders. The bezel holds an inlay of black glass with a white ring surrounding an intaglio head of Medusa. She is portrayed as a beautiful woman, her head inclined at a slight angle, with wings at her temples. The heads of two snakes appear above the top of her head, their tails knotted below her chin. To either side, above the wings, C—E, and below the head B—A. Very pleasing style.
$4,250
15A035
OPENWORK FINGER RING
Roman, 2nd–3rd century A.D. Gold, with nicolo inset. Length at shoulder: 3 cm (1.18 in) The ring is decorated with openwork and scroll patterns. From its narrow base the hoop expands and splits in two, terminating in two paired volutes. The large and elaborate upper surface encloses the stone in a bezel consisting of two concentric ovals, framed by paired double volutes on each shoulder and on each side.
Parallels: Christie’s, New York, 8 December 2005, lot 118; for the openwork setting, see Christie’s, London, 25 April 2007, lot 187. Rare and desirable.
$14,500
15A036
FINGER RING
Roman, 3rd century A.D. Silver, with gilding. Length at shoulder: 3.3 cm (1.3 in) The hoop is plain, becoming thicker at the shoulders and flat on the top. The decoration consists of two concentric rings framing a radiate, draped bust of Helios right. The god is portrayed with a frontal eye and wavy hair falling almost to his shoulder. Gilding covers the frame, background, rays, and the lower fold of the drapery at the neck. The god’s face and hair are silver, as is the upper fold of his drapery.
$3,250
15A037
VOTIVE AXE HEAD
Roman, Central or Eastern Europe, 1st–3rd century A.D. Silver. Height of axes: 4.7 cm (1.85 in)
Height with loop: 7.3 cm (2.87 in) This unusual but elegant object is probably a votive axe head worn on a necklace, as a model in precious metal of a more functional tool. On either side of the flaring blade are busts of goddesses, each of whom wears a pinned cloak and holds a small animal. On one side the divinity cradles a hare in her arms, which nibbles on a bunch of grapes. She wears a mural crown like those often worn by Tyche and by native Celtic goddesses associated with the goddess of luck, such as Tutela and Epona. The deity on the opposite side holds a different animal, possibly a fox or a cat, but has no fruit. Her crown is not clearly mural in type, but her general resemblance to the first goddess is obvious. Above their heads is rectangular molding decorated with chevrons or laurel leaves, and a small block with simple dotted floral patterns on the sides. On top of the block is a bearded male head in relief, doubtless a third deity but also unidentified. The thick, tapering silver wire that passes through the shaft hole of the axe is twisted back at the ends to form a suspension ring of asymmetrical, rather baroque form.
Model axes have been found on temple sites and represent implements of sacrifice. The two goddess of the sides reflect an attempt to depict a pair of local deities from Central or Eastern Europe, perhaps associated with the fertility of crops and game, in an idealized Classical style that borrows from the iconography of Tyche.
Ex Christie’s, New York, 6 December 2000, lot 153, and Antiqua VII, A13. Unique and highly important.
$22,000
15A038
MALE PORTRAIT HEAD
Roman, 3rd century A.D. Quartzite. The lifesize portrait head depicts a mature bearded man with a somewhat pensive or brooding expression. He has an oval face with a deeply furrowed forehead and bushy eyebrows knit over deep-set lidded eyes without indication of pupils. He has pronounced cheekbones, slightly sunken cheeks, pursed lips, prominent ears, and close-cropped curly hair, moustache and beard. His hair recedes slightly at the temples, and his beard extends from his lower lip onto his neck.
Quartzite is a fairly rare and unusual stone for portraiture, marble being the preferred medium. Its use may be indicative of a provincial origin.
Ex Port collection, Santa Monica, California; ex Ariadne Galleries, c. 1985.
Parallels: See two heads in the Metropolitan Museum, one marble (inv. 07.286.112), the other bronze (inv. 13.225.1), illustrated in G.M.A. Richter, Roman Portraits (New York, 1948), figs. 94 and 98; a bronze head in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (inv. 96.703), illustrated in Greek and Roman Portraits: 470 BC–AD 500 (Boston, 1959), no. 61 = Romans and Barbarians (Boston, 1976), pp. 98–99, no. 108; a marble head in the Selcuk Museum (inv. 1032), published in J. Inan and E. Rosenbaum, Roman and Early Byzantine Portrait Sculpture in Asia Minor (London, 1966), p. 141, no. 177, pl. 104.3–4; a marble bust in the Getty Museum, Malibu (inv. 73.AA.42), published in Handbook of the Antiquities Collection (Los Angeles, 2002), p. 171; a marble head in the Archaeological Museum, Athens (inv. 349), published by N. Kaltsas, Sculpture in the National Archaeological Museum, Athens (Athens, 2002), p. 370, no. 787; a marble head in the Bardo Museum (inv. 2635), published in A. Ben Abed Ben Khader and D. Soren, eds. Tip of nose partially restored. Slight scrape in back of head.
$32,000
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15A039
APPLIQUÉ OF HERCULES
Roman, 1st–2nd century A.D. Silver. The nude Hercules stands on a shallow base, his weight on his right leg. The muscular hero is represented as stocky and short-limbed. His lion skin, with traces of gilding, is draped over his left arm and his left hand holds a cup of wine, while his right hand steadies his club on the ground. The figure is hollow in back and probably served as an ornamental appliqué.
$3,950
15A040
APPLIQUÉ OF MINERVA
SOLD
Roman, 1st–2nd century A.D. Silver. The figurine shows an armless bust of Minerva, the Roman goddess of war and wisdom. She wears an Attic-style helmet with visor, raised cheek guards, and a feathered plume parted down the center. On her breast is the scaly aegis with the head of the gorgon Medusa affixed. Minerva’s eyes are large, recalling the epithet of her Greek counterpart, Glaukopis, “Owl-Eyed.” All the details of flesh and costume are finely chased, and the well-preserved gilding of the helmet and aegis emphasize the silvery sheen of the goddess herself. The bust of Minerva is hollow and probably served as an ornamental attachment to a fine silver object.
Parallels: Busts of Minerva are much commoner in bronze than in precious metal. These differ in detail, but most agree in showing the goddess wearing a Corinthian helmet. See Babelon and Blanchet, Catalogue des bronzes antiques de la Bibliothèque Nationale (Paris, 1895), p. 79, nos. 173–174; Fleischer, pls. 23–24; Boucher p. 198, no. 343; Bronze der Schweiz V, pl. 37–41. Fine details, exquisite style.
$4,500
15A041
LAMP
SOLD
Central Italian, c. 175–250 A.D. Terracotta with brown slip. Diameter of discus: 9.4 cm (3.7 in) Buff with traces of brown slip. Mold-made lamp with round body, incised ring handle and semicircular nozzle. In the discus is a scene of pastoral revelry: a seminude nymph stands in the center, looking right, holding a thyrsus in her right hand and placing her left over the shoulder of a nude Pan who wraps his right hand around her waist and holds a lagobolon in his left hand; to the left a second Pan strides left, looking back at the couple and holding a syrinx in his right and and a lagobolon in his left. The shoulder is ornamented with vine leaves and grape clusters, meeting at a set of concentric rings at the base of the nozzle. On the base is incised the maker’s signature: EXO EFL I.POMPEI PONIINU. For shape, see BMC II, 1392–1393; for shoulder decoration, see BMC II, 1397. Extremely rare and an unpublished scene. With custom stand. Intact.
$4,250
15A042
INK WELL
Roman, c. 4th century A.D. Bone. Maximum diameter: 3.3 cm (1.3 in) The inkstand is composed of a hollow bone, filled at the bottom and top. The upper filling is round and very slightly convex, with pale green coloring around the hole, bounded by an incised ring. The sides are decorated in relief with the bust of a matron in an oval frame supported by two flying cupids. Rare and intact.
$3,850
15A043
CHRISTIAN LAMP
SOLD
Carthage, c. 422–500 A.D. Red clay and slip. Diameter of discus: 8 cm (3.15 in) Red ware discus lamp with Christogram in relief in discus. The monogram of Christ is decorated with a geometric pattern composed of concentric circles, lozenges, and pellets. The shoulder frame of the lamp is adorned with slightly less than lifesize renditions of solidi of Theodosius II, half showing the obverse with a military bust of the emperor facing three-quarters right, and half showing the reverse with Victory holding a long cross. At the nozzle end of the shoulder frame are two rectangles decorated with lozenges. On the lower side of the lamp, in ink, is written #952 Sbeitla, Tunisia, and on the bottom 439 AD.
Parallels: For other lamps from the same mold, see A. Ennabli, Lampes chrétiennes de Tunisie (Paris 1976), pl. lii, 952 (illustrated in color on the front cover) and BMC III, Q1766 MLA.
The only example with renditions of coins, circulating at the time, used as a decoration. Ex private California collection. Very rare. Intact.
$2,750
15A044
CHRISTIAN LAMP
Carthage, c. 400–500 A.D. Red clay and slip. Diameter of discus: 7.5 cm (215/16 in) Red ware discus lamp with Saint Abdon in relief in the discus. The nimbate saint stands facing in prayer, his arms spread, wearing a Phrygian cap on his head and an ample robe with ornamental bands on the shoulders and two fan-shaped groups of pleats(?), one above the other. The shoulder frame of the lamp is decorated with alternating chevrons and vine leaves.
Parallel: For a lamp from the same mold, see A. Ennabli, Lampes chrétiennes de Tunisie (Paris 1976), pl. v, 115, and for the mold itself, see BMC III, 1794 MLA. Rare. Intact.
$750
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