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Lot 114

A South Italian terracotta roundel with head of Alexander Gorgoneion

Antiquities
3 July 2019, 10:00 BST
London, New Bond Street

£3,500 - £5,500

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A South Italian terracotta roundel with head of Alexander Gorgoneion
Hellenistic Period, circa 3rd Century B.C.
Decorated in relief with a frontal head of Alexander, his abundant, snake-like locks falling to his shoulders, with a torq and collar of radiating scales forming the background, two small perforations at the top, 18cm high

Footnotes

Provenance:
with Hurst Gallery, Cambridge, Massachusetts in March 1998.

According to myth, when the Gorgon was slain by Perseus he mounted its head on his shield. This shield was then gifted by Athena to Achilles, and finally claimed by Alexander the Great from the Temple of Athena-Ilia at Troy. The roundel may have been intended to symbolise this legendary shield.

Such terracotta roundels served as oscilla, votive offerings designed to sway in the wind, and were in widespread production in southern Italy during the Hellenistic period. See M. L. Ferruzza, Ancient Terracottas from South Italy and Sicily in the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, 2016, p. 206, no. 59, for a comparable terracotta clipeus, and N. Yalouris, The Search for Alexander, Boston, 1980, p, 152, no. 96, for a further miniature Alexander Gorgoneion.

Additional information

Bid now on these items

An Anatolian marble idol
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