An important Mamluk rock crystal Intaglio Ring Egypt, 14th Century
£4,000 - £6,000
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Find your local specialistAn important Mamluk rock crystal Intaglio Ring
Egypt, 14th Century
Egypt, 14th Century
2.8 cm. high
Footnotes
Provenance: Acquired by the present owner in London circa 1960.
The Mamluk attribution is made by virtue of comparison of the Lion with the heraldic blazon prominent on the coinage of the Mamluk Sultan Al-Zahir Rukn al din Baybars (658-76 AH/ 1260-77 AD). For examples of coins with the Baybars lion, see Paul Balog, "The Coinage of Mamluk Sultans of Egypt and Syria" in American Numismatic Society No. 12, New York, 1964, nos. 28-49, and for a discussion of the lion in this context, see L.A. Mayer, Saracenic Heraldry, Oxford, 1933, p. 9. Lot 474 in the present sale is a Mamluk pottery shard also depicting a heraldic lion. For a stone plaque of the same period depicting a left-facing lion with raised right paw and back-curling tail also facing the viewer, see Esin Atil, Renaissance of Islam: Art of the Mamluks, Washington D.C., 1981, no. 108.