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A Sculpted Dish from Tello Made of a Rare Stone (Louvre–AO 153)

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A Sculpted Dish from Tello Made of a Rare Stone (Louvre–AO 153) A Sculpted Dish from Tello Made of a Rare Stone (Louvre–AO 153) FRANÇOIS DESSET, UMR 7041 / University of Teheran* GIANNI MARCHESI, University of Bologna MASSIMO VIDALE, University of Padua JOHANNES PIGNATTI, “La Sapienza” University of Rome Introduction Close formal and stylistic comparisons with other artifacts of the same period from Tello make it clear A fragment of a sculpted stone dish from Tello (an- that Waagenophyllum limestone, stemming probably cient Ĝirsu), which was found in the early excavations from some Iranian source, was imported to Ĝirsu directed by Ernest de Sarzec, has been as studied by to be locally carved in Sumerian style in the palace us in the frame of a wider research project on artifacts workshops. Mesopotamian objects made of this rare made of a peculiar dark grey limestone spotted with stone provide another element for reconstructing white-to-pink fossil corals of the genus Waagenophyl- the patterns of material exchange between southern lum. Recorded in an old inventory of the Louvre, Mesopotamia and the Iranian Plateau in the late 3rd the piece in question has quite surprisingly remained millennium BC. unpublished until now. The special points of interest to be addressed here are: the uncommon type of stone, which was pre- The Artifact sumably obtained from some place in Iran; the finely We owe the first description of this dish fragment carved lion image that decorates the vessel; and the (Figs. 1–3), which bears the museum number AO mysterious iconographic motif that is placed on the 153, to Léon Heuzey: lion’s shoulder. A partially preserved Sumerian inscrip- tion, most probably to be attributed to the famous Une disposition semblable, mais dans des pro- ruler Gudea of Lagash should also be noted.1 portions beaucoup plus petites, se voit au pour- tour d’un élégant plateau circulaire, dont il ne * This artifact was generously brought to our attention by reste aussi qu’un fragment. Seulement, comme Beatrice André and Ariane Thomas, respectively Director of the Department of Near Eastern Antiquities and Curator of the Mes- le rebord n’a qu’une très faible élévation, le lion, opotamian Section of the Louvre. The pictures (Figs. 1–2, 5–6, dont la tête fait saillie, y était représenté couché. and 8–11) were taken by Edoardo Loliva (Istituto Superiore per Il devait y en avoir trois ou quatre; mais il ne la Conservazione e il Restauro, Rome). We would like to express reste que la partie antérieure de l’un d’eux. Sur our gratitude to all of them. The abbreviations used in this article are those of The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the 1 See G. Marchesi, “Gudea and the Master of Lions: Philological University of Chicago (Chicago, 1956–2010). Notes on the Louvre Dish AO 153,” in this issue of JNES. [JNES 75 no. 1 (2016)] © 2016 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved. 022–2968–2016/7501–005 $10.00. DOI: 10.1086/684811 71 72 ) Journal of Near Eastern Studies Figure 1—The stone dish AO 153—general view of the outer surface (photo E. Loliva; courtesy Musée du Louvre). le plat du rebord, un débris d’inscription, en car- seen in Fig. 4a.4 The animals were probably carved in actères élégants et un peu allongés, de l’époque a single row: beside the head of the preserved figure, de Dounghi, indique que ce bel objet avait été one sees what is left of the curved tail of the preced- consacré “pour la prolongation de la vie” d’un ing feline, and the circumference exactly fits the arc prince, dont le nom manque. La matière, dont occupied by six lions.5 un autre petit éclat a été recueilli, est d’une The wall of the plate is thick and sturdy, and the in- rareté exceptionnelle; c’est une sorte de marbre ner base is convex. For some reason, the inner surface d’un bleu ardoise, moucheté et comme étoilé of the fragment has a peculiar rough texture, which de blanc, par des perforations madréporiques.2 contrasts with the highly polished look of the outer surface and the lower base. Judging from what re- Fig. 4b shows our reconstruction of the dish from mains of the plate, a stone block with vertical fossils the surviving fragment (14×12×6 cm). Its diameter was cut transversally to the main axis of the coral’s at the rim was about 36 cm, and the wall is about 6 columnar growth, so that the coral calices on the base cm high. The estimated diameter would have accom- look like regularly-spaced round spots, whereas along modated six lions of the same size as the one preserved along the circumference of the vessel.3 This recon- struction is based on the AutoCAD rotatory model and Heuzey, Découvertes, 223–24 and pl. 1ter, no. 2; U. Moortgat- Correns, La Mesopotamia (Torino, 1989), 57. 2 E. de Sarzec and L. Heuzey, Découvertes en Chaldée (Paris, 4 I.e., a drawing, in AutoCAD, of the surviving part of the dish, 1884–1912), 232. See also L. Heuzey, Catalogue des antiquités rotated to fit exactly the geometry of the original unbroken arti- chaldéennes: Sculpture et gravure a la pointe (Paris, 1902), 159, no. fact. We owe the model and the reconstruction here proposed to 40; A. Parrot, Tello: Vingt campagnes de fouilles (1877–1933) (Paris, A. Cherubini, an architect specializing in archaeological recording 1948), 196; E. A. Braun-Holzinger, Mesopotamische Weihgaben der and reconstructions. frühdynastischen bis altbabylonischen Zeit, Heidelberger Studien 5 The preserved fragment demonstrates that at least two lions zum Alten Orient 3 (Heidelberg, 1991), 183, G 334. were in a row in the same posture. Our reconstruction assumes that 3 Six lions in a row also occur on the famous mace-head of Me- six felines crouched one after the other in the same direction, but salim, dedicated to the patron god of Ĝirsu, Ninĝirsu; see de Sarzec we cannot exclude other arrangements. A Sculpted Dish from Tello Made of a Rare Stone (Louvre—AO 153) ) 73 Figure 2—AO 153—zenithal view of the inner surface (photo E. Loliva; courtesy Musée du Louvre). 74 ) Journal of Near Eastern Studies Figure 3—AO 153—section (photo M. Vidale; courtesy Musée du Louvre). the walls, and on the bodies of the felines, the same served) that synoptically represent the whiskers (vibris- fossils take the form of short, thick wavy stripes.6 sae), and the rows of small dots at their bases, which The carving shows a good balance between strongly are typical of large cats. The staring eyes are carefully stylized forms and naturalistic rendering. Only the li- incised with a thin double line, and the sloping fore- on’s head, turned right, is in high relief. The back and head interrupts a deeply-carved band (visible below the the shoulder of the animal, in bas-relief, look powerful ears), hatched with transversal segments, which has no and muscular, thanks to the careful carving of the mane, anatomical reference. From the rear of the forelimb which is divided into five rows of slightly S-shaped rect- departs another thick tuft of fur. The curved surface angles representing as many tufts. The body’s volume of the forelimb suggests the volumes of the muscles, is well suggested by the upward bending of the upper while on the fracture, at the left, there is an element in rows. The lion, portrayed with closed jaws, turns di- the shape of tip (the lion’s penis?). rectly onward to face the viewer in a peaceful attitude.7 Finally, the enigmatic circular element with ap- The muzzle (Fig. 5) is rendered in a simple but elegant pended wing-like features on the rear shoulder of the fashion: here, note the triangular tip of the nose, and lion should be noted (Fig. 6). For this iconographic the symmetry of the two sides of the muzzle, whose motif, which is also found elsewhere, see the discus- lines close into two palmette-like features (poorly pre- sion below (pp. 80–84). 6 Although Marco Polo relates to have seen, at the court of the Khan, large cats with white, black and red stripes, which were “mag- The Stone giori de’ leoni di Babilonia” (Il Milione, ch. XIV), adult lions have a uniform fur, without stripes or any other contrasting pattern. Marco The base material of AO 153 can be identified as a Polo’s striped lions were in all likelihood tigers. The white vertical Permian dark grey limestone rich in white fossil colo- stripes created by the corals on the lions of our dish have therefore nial tetracorals, belonging to the order Rugosa and the no zoological correspondence, but stripes might have added to the genus Waagenophyllum, named after the German ge- fantastic nature of the sculpted felines. ologist and palaeontologist Wilhelm Heinrich Waagen 7 Compare the lions of the so-called Burney Relief (Fig. 12, No. 5; after D. Collon, The Queen of the Night [London, 2005], 6, fig. (1841–1900), who was active in British India from 1 + 32, fig. 12), which according to D. Collon, “look outwards, 1870 to 1875. Outcrops of this rare material were proud, on guard, alert and apparently fully in control” (ibid., 35). identified at various locations on the Iranian Plateau, A Sculpted Dish from Tello Made of a Rare Stone (Louvre—AO 153) ) 75 Figure 4a—Rotatory model based upon the surviving shard, supporting the reconstruction of Fig. 4b (A. Cherubini and M. Vidale). along the coasts of the Gulf, and in the inner Oman peninsula.
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