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Gold rattle. (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul) -
Gold rattle. (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul)
Gold rattle
The Lydians and their World
(2010)
Cat. 135
- Date
- Early fifth century BC?, Late Lydian (Persian)
- Museum
- Istanbul, Archaeological Museum, 4562
- Museum Inventory No.
- 4562
- Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
- IAM 4562
- Material
- Gold
- Object Type
- Metalwork
- Metalwork Type
- Miscellaneous
- Site
- Sardis
- Sector
- Nec
- Trench
- Butler Tomb 213
- Locus
- Butler Tomb 213
- Description
- Hollow gold spool-shaped rattle. Cylinder, concave in profile, capped at either end by slightly convex disks. Disks are decorated with concentric circles of fine gold wire. A narrow gold cylinder forms a central tube, opening through holes in the disk caps. Inside the spool are 27 gold pellets, which rattled when the spool was shaken. Diameter of disks 0.053 m, length of cylinder 0.032 m, weight 62.5 g.
- Comments
- From Tomb 213 at Sardis. A pair of similar gold rattles was found in the Toptepe Tumulus (No. 174), and another pair in the Tilkitepe Tumulus near Alaşehir. The uses of these objects are uncertain; attached to the end of wooden rods, they might have served as noisemakers.
- See Also
- Baughan, “Lydian Burial Customs”.
- Bibliography
- Curtis 1925, no. 85.
- Author
- NDC