Five Roman to Byzantine Miniature Figures - Animals & Cross

Mediterranean, Roman to Byzantine culture. A compact assemblage of five miniature cast figures, four in a leaded copper alloy with green cuprous patina and one in soft grey lead. The largest is a winged creature with outspread pinions and a broad, flat-faced head, perhaps a griffin or harpy, rising from a stepped plinth in the manner of a cista foot; beside it stands a second winged fitting still retaining its iron attachment shank. Two birds follow, one a crested rooster with incised wing feathering, the other a plump dove or pigeon on a rounded tenon. A small lead cross with flaring arms and a pierced lower terminal completes the group, likely a pilgrim's or devotional pendant of the later Christian centuries. The rooster and the dove carry unusually durable symbolic freight across this span of centuries. In Roman practice the cockerel belonged to Mercury, a companion animal of the herald god and a marker of vigilance and dawn; under Christianity it became an emblem of resurrection and of Peter's denial, while the dove served both as Venus's bird and, later, as the Holy Spirit. Small cast zoomorphs of this kind functioned as vessel and box fittings, furniture terminals, votives, and apotropaic charms, and the iron shank surviving in one example here shows how such figures were pinned to a wooden or metal carcass rather than displayed free-standing. A Certificate of Authenticity will accompany all winning bids. Item # 204923

Estimate:£186.88

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