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Bridle ornament in the form of a raptor head. (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul)
Bridle ornament in the form of a raptor head
The Lydians and their World
(2010)
Cat. 50
- Date
- Late 7th to early 6th c BC., Lydian
- Museum
- Manisa, Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum, 5941
- Museum Inventory No.
- 5941
- Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
- M68.001
- Material
- Bronze/Copper Alloy, Lead
- Object Type
- Metalwork
- Metalwork Type
- Horsetrapping
- Site
- Sardis
- Sector
- PN
- Trench
- PN
- B-Grid Coordinates
- W260.7 / S344.5 *86.8
- Description
- Bronze, with a filling of lead. The ornament features a raptor “head with solid curved beak and hollow neck forming base. The round eyes are in relief; pupil and beak defined by incision. The neck is pierced laterally by four circular openings; a fifth perforation is at the base” (Waldbaum 1983, 40). Maximum height 0.042 m.
- Comments
- Recovered from an extramural occupation quarter at Sardis (excavation sector PN). The piece is a Riemenkreuzung, which stabilized the crossing of two bridle straps (like two others, No. 51). “The once hollow neck was filled with lead secondarily, perhaps to convert it into a weight” (Waldbaum 1983, 40). Identified as “pseudonomadische” by Ivantchik.
- See Also
- Greenewalt, “Horsemanship”.
- Bibliography
- Waldbaum 1983a, 40, no. 85; Ivantchik 2001, 79-81, fig. 34, no. 4.
- Author
- CHG