• latw-167-5
    Silver and gold phiale with Persian king/hero, overview of bottom. (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul)
  • latw-167-10
    Silver and gold phiale with Persian king/hero, overview (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul)
  • latw-167-20
    Silver and gold phiale with Persian king/hero, detail of Persian king/hero. (Courtesy of the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum, Istanbul)

Silver and gold phiale with Persian king/hero

Date
Late 6th or early 5th c BC, Late Lydian (Persian)
Museum
Uşak, Archaeological Museum, 1.29.96
Museum Inventory No.
1.29.96
Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
Uşak 1.29.96
Material
Silver
Object Type
Metalwork
Metalwork Type
Metal Vessel
Site
Ikiztepe Tumulus
Description
The shallow bowl has an offset rim, and an extremely shallow omphalos with a centering mark on the underside. The bowl itself is silver, the gold decoration was made separately and applied. The ten tear-shaped lobes are hollow, slotted into grooves on the wall of the vessel, the lip around the outer edge of the groove folded and hammered down over a flange around the lobe (the same method is used for Özgen and Öztürk 1996, nos. 34, 36 and 37). Alternating with the lobes are ten plaques of a Persian male figure shown walking left, with one foot on each of a pair of addorsed eagle heads which surmount a ring. The figure is bearded and wears a crown. He holds before him with both hands a long spear, and he carries on his back a bow and quiver. The stance and attributes are commonly seen on Persian seals. Whether such figures are to be identified as the Persian king or a hero is a question which has yet to be resolved. The motif on the pointed projection at the bottom of the rings may be a hoofed foot device, rather than an ivy leaf.

The hoofed foot device appears as a motif on vessels from South Russia (Maikop). D. B. Stronach has commented that the forward position of vertical pleats in the dress of the ‘Persian king’ is a feature of early Achaemenian art and compatible with a date in the late 6th century BC. Applied plaques of a Persian male figure, shown killing a lion, appear on the bowl (Özgen and Öztürk 1996, no. 34), and there are gold plaques of crowned Persian male figures with bow and quiver, walking right, on a hemispherical silver bowl in the British Museum (WA 134740)” (Özgen and Öztürk 1996). Height 0.036 m, diameter at rim 0.153 m, diameter of body 0.13 m, weight 245.9 g.

Comments
From the Ikiztepe Tumulus.
See Also
Özgen, “Lydian Treasure”; Baughan, “Lydian Burial Customs”.
Bibliography
Özgen and Öztürk 1996, no. 33.
Author
İÖ