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Property from the Michel Holley Collection (lots 1-9)
Lot 7

A Cypriot Bichrome Ware terracotta model boat

Antiquities
1 December 2020, 11:00 GMT
London, New Bond Street

Sold for £1,912.50 inc. premium

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A Cypriot Bichrome Ware terracotta model boat
Iron Age, Cypro-Archaic, circa 600-400 B.C.
The oval craft with rounded prow and stern, both the interior and exterior decorated with red and umber stripes, 12.5cm long

Footnotes

Provenance:
Michel Holley collection, Paris, acquired in the 1970s.

For another example of a small model boat decorated with red and black stripes, see D. Morris, The Art of Ancient Cyprus, Oxford, 1985, pl. 289, p. 263. These model boats/canoes became particularly popular in the Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age. They sometimes carry a single human figure shown holding onto the sides of the canoe, as Dr Morris suggests, 'waiting for a suitable current to sweep him away to the afterlife'.

Michel Holley (b. 1924) is a noted architect, and sailing enthusiast. M. Holley studied architecture at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, in the studio of Otello Zavaronia, and was elected Grand Massier in 1954. A keen member of the Royal Ocean Racing Club, M. Holley took part in the 1973 Cowes Admiralty Cup with the Izenah IV. His love of the nautical inspired his collection, which though drawn from the breadth of the Greek, Roman and Egyptian cultures, is bound by a fascination with seafaring. Formed in the early 1970s, this collection comes to auction for the first time.

Additional information

Bid now on these items

An Anatolian marble idol
A Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone with dedication inscription of King Lipit-Ishtar of Isin
A small Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone inscribed for King Sin-Kashid of Uruk
A Neo-Assyrian or Neo-Hittite bronze helmet with pelta-shaped cheek-pieces
A Babylonian agate "eye-stone" bead, inscribed for Nebuchadnezzar II
A large Etruscan Impasto Ware pottery olla
A Roman marble torso of a youth wearing a tunic
A Roman marble head of a satyr
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A Greek bronze horse
A Greek pottery alabastron in the form of a greaved leg
A Greek green glazed faience hedgehog aryballos
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