Luristan Bronze Cloak Pin, Cruciform Finial, Zagros

Near East, Western Persia, Iron Age, Luristan. A long tapering shaft of cast bronze rises to an abstract sculptural head: a domed central knob crowning a short cruciform block from which three blunt horizontal projections radiate, giving the finial the compact geometry of a miniature hammer or standard. Below the head, a small transverse drill hole pierces the shaft, the anchor point for a securing cord or chain that kept the pin from slipping free of the cloth. The surface carries a mottled green and brown patina typical of long burial. Pins of this class fastened heavy woolen garments at the shoulder and doubled as personal ornament and status marker among the pastoral communities of the Zagros highlands; many were later deposited in graves and sanctuary hoards alongside horse gear, weapons, and votive bronzes. The bronzes of Luristan, produced in the mountain valleys of the western Zagros between roughly the twelfth and seventh centuries BCE, constitute one of the most inventive metalworking traditions of the ancient Near East. Lacking monumental architecture, their makers poured their ambition into portable cast objects: cheekpieces, standards, whetstone handles, votive figures, and pins. The pin was among the most common and most varied of these forms, ranging from plain shafts to elaborate disc heads engraved with masters of animals and confronted beasts. The drilled shaft is a recurring practical feature, allowing a retaining cord to secure the pin to the garment, and it also encouraged reuse as a suspended pendant. Because so much Luristan material entered collections through the antiquities market of the early twentieth century rather than controlled excavation, typological comparison rather than stratigraphy remains the principal dating tool for pieces of this kind. Item # 204607

Estimate:£170.26

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