Francesca Hickin
Head of Department
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Lot 109
A Greek parcel gilt silver emblema in the form of a bust of Isis
28 November 2019, 10:30 GMT
London, New Bond Street£20,000 - £30,000
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A Greek parcel gilt silver emblema in the form of a bust of Isis
Hellenistic Period, circa 2nd-1st Century B.C.
Hammered from a single sheet and worked in high relief repoussé, the details chased, the goddess depicted wearing a gilded characteristic fringed mantle over one shoulder and knotted at the breasts, the right breast exposed, and a gilded foliate wreath atop her wavy hair, her locks set into stylized 'Libyan' corkscrew curls falling onto her shoulders, her plump matronly face with large, articulated lidded eyes and rounded chin, her sensuous lips slightly parted, with Venus lines on the neck emphasized, a lotiform sceptre or thrysos in the field behind her right shoulder, the background stippled, small attachment holes around the outer edge, once attached to the tondo of a bowl, 7.4cm diam.
Hellenistic Period, circa 2nd-1st Century B.C.
Hammered from a single sheet and worked in high relief repoussé, the details chased, the goddess depicted wearing a gilded characteristic fringed mantle over one shoulder and knotted at the breasts, the right breast exposed, and a gilded foliate wreath atop her wavy hair, her locks set into stylized 'Libyan' corkscrew curls falling onto her shoulders, her plump matronly face with large, articulated lidded eyes and rounded chin, her sensuous lips slightly parted, with Venus lines on the neck emphasized, a lotiform sceptre or thrysos in the field behind her right shoulder, the background stippled, small attachment holes around the outer edge, once attached to the tondo of a bowl, 7.4cm diam.
Footnotes
Provenance:
Mr A. collection, Paris, acquired prior to December 1995.
Isis is depicted here as a syncretistic deity, combining the attributes of major goddesses of the Graeco-Egyptian pantheon. That the goddess depicted here is Isis is fairly clear - her hair and dress are characteristic. However, this goddess could also be identified as Isis-Demeter, goddess of crops and vegetation, by her foliate wreath, and the lotiform sceptre, associated perhaps with the torch Demeter used to search for her lost daughter, Persephone. In addition, the goddess's exposed breast calls to mind Isis-Aphrodite. This emblema thereby reflects the amalgamation of Egyptian and Greek religious systems which took place during the Hellenistic period, initiated by Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt and the Greek island states. From this period onwards, Isis was broadly recognised in the Graeco-Roman world as a powerful mother goddess, with a strong link to fecundity.
This rare and interesting emblema was likely once attached to the tondo of a gilded silver dish, a luxury item at the time of manufacture. The placement of such emblemae on the interior of a dish designates it as a decorative show-vessel, as its basic function would be compromised. See an example of one of these highly decorative dishes with an emblema depicting Cleopatra Selene still affixed, which was found in a villa at Boscoreale, near Pompeii, in 1895, and is now in the Louvre (acc. no. Bj 1969; S. Walker and P. Higgs, Cleopatra of Egypt, from History to Myth, London, 2001, p. 312-3). See also three examples of silver dishes from the Hildesheim treasure, depicting Minerva, the infant Hercules, and Attis (now in the Altes Museum, Berlin).