Antiquities Exhibits

In 628–29 CE the Byzantine emperor Herakleios (also spelled Heraclius) (r. 610–41) successfully ended a long, costly war with Persia and regained Jerusalem, Egypt, and other Byzantine territory. Silver stamps dating to 613–29/30 on the reverse of these masterpieces place their manufacture in Herakleios’s reign. The biblical figures on the plates wear the costume of the early Byzantine court, suggesting to the viewer that, like Saul and David, the Byzantine emperor was a ruler chosen by God. Elaborate dishes used for display at banquets were common in the late Roman and early Byzantine world; generally decorated with classical themes, these objects conveyed wealth, social status, and learning. This set of silver plates may be the earliest surviving example of the use of biblical scenes for such displays. Their intended arrangement may have closely followed the biblical order of the events, and their display may have conformed to the shape of a Christogram, or monogram for the name of Ch...

Winged male figures that are distinct from Hermes appear quite frequently in Attic art of the mid-sixth century B.C.E. Without inscriptions they are difficult to identify. In all of Greek art, the distinction between the human and the divine, the tangible and intangible, is elusive. Although we do not know all of their names, these figures surely move between various orders of reality.  - Metropolitan Museum of Art Besides Hermes, one of the best known of these winged deities is Morpheus, the son of sleep and associated with sleep and dreams.   In Ovid's Metamorphoses, he is one of the thousand sons of Somnus and he appears in dreams in human form.   According to Ovid "no other is more skilled than he in representing the gait, the features, and the speech of men. The clothing also and the accustomed words of each he represents." Ovid gives names to two more of these sons of Sleep. One called Icelos ('Like'), by the gods, but Phobetor ('Frightener') by men,...

While I was researching the Cypriot ear spirals yesterday, I noticed this bronze bust of a priest with silver inlaid eyes dated from the 3rd - 4th century CE at the Miho Museum.  The museum identified it as late Roman but the museum's image had been shared on Flickr and I noticed that someone with the username eternal persia commented on the piece and insisted it was Sasanian.  He/she pointed to the monogram on the hat, clothes, hair design and leaves that decorate the bust and insisted these are Sasanian elements. Intrigued, I researched the item a little further.  At first, most Sasanian portrait sculptures I reviewed were all bearded.  Then I saw an image of a relief depicting Kartir, a high priest and vizier serving during the reigns of Shapur I, Hormizd I, Bahram I, and Bahram II. Not only is Kartir clean shaven, he sports the corkscrew curls and crested hat worn by the priest of the bust at the Miho Museum. Some scholars think Kartir may have been a eunuch, due...

Sasanian silver plates were usually hammered into shape and then decorated using a variety of complex techniques.  Gilding was often used to highlight the hunter, usually the king, and sometimes extra pieces of metal were added to create high relief. The king as hunter became a standard image on silver plates during the reign of Shapur II (r. 310–379 CE). The motif symbolizes the prowess of Sasanian rulers, and these royal plates were often sent as gifts to neighboring and vassal courts.  Some plates included inscriptions with the king's name and the plate's weight.  With other plates, art historians must attempt to identify the king by his distinctive apparel or shape of the crown he wears.  Each Sasanian king wore a different personal crown, which became more and more elaborate during the four centuries of the dynasty. Fortunately, the different crowns have been identified from coins or sometimes compared with existing rock reliefs with inscriptions such as those a...

When Ardashir I (r. 224-241 CE) founded the Sasanian Empire, he created a  standing army which was under his personal command and whose officers were separate from satraps, local princes and nobility. He restored the Achaemenid military organizations, retained the Parthian cavalry model, and employed new types of armor and siege warfare techniques.  Organizationally, the Shahanshah (the King of Kings) served as the head of the military and there were four military commanders under his authority. Initially, the offices of the Great King of Armenia, King of Meshan, King of Gilan, and King of Sakastan fulfilled these roles. After the reforms of Khosrow I, there were four spahbeds (Army Commanders), each for a cardinal direction. In the character of their warfare, the Persians of the Sasanian period differed greatly, though, from their forebears under the Achaemenid kings. The war chariot was no longer used, the  elephant corps was advanced to a very prominent and important p...

The wild boar features prominently in the cultures of Indo-European people, many of which saw the animal as embodying warrior virtues. Cultures throughout Europe and Asia Minor saw the killing of a boar as proof of one's valor and strength. Neolithic hunter gatherers depicted reliefs of ferocious wild boars on their temple pillars at Göbekli Tepe some 11,600 years ago. Virtually all heroes in Greek mythology fight or kill a boar at one point. The demigod Herakles' third labor involves the capture of the Erymanthian Boar, Theseus slays the wild sow Phaea, and a disguised Odysseus is recognised by his handmaiden Eurycleia by the scars inflicted on him by a boar during a hunt in his youth. To the mythical Hyperboreans, the boar represented spiritual authority. Several Greek myths use the boar as a symbol of darkness, death and winter. One example is the story of the youthful Adonis, who is killed by a boar and is permitted by Zeus to depart from Hades only during the spring and su...

Silver Sasanian Horse-Shaped Drinking Vessel 200-325 CE at the Cleveland Art Museum in Cleveland, Ohio. The horse was a favorite artistic subject in ancient Iran, where horsebreeding flourished. This muscular Sasanian stallion was descended from the royal and sacred Nisean breed of the Achaemenian Persians. Although now extinct, Nisean horses were highly sought after in the ancient world. The ancient Greeks called him the Nis ean after the town Nisa, where he was bred but the Chinese called him the Tien Ma – Heavenly Horse or Soulon-Vegetarian dragon. The horse came in a variety of colors including the more common dark bay, chesnut and seal brown but also the more rare black, roan, palomino, and various spotted patterns. The royal Nisean was the mount of the nobility in ancient Persia. Two gray Nisean stallions pulled the King of Kings’ royal chariot, while four of the regal animals pulled the chariot of Ahura Mazda, the supreme god of Persia and Medea. Cyrus the Great was so distr...

Ancient Iran: a glimpse of Persian art and architecture under the Sassanids.  The Sassanid dynasty of ancient Persia was established in 224 CE when Ardashir I overthrew the Parthian empire.  Sassanid monuments in such cities as Ardashir Khurreh and Bishapur incorporate domes and squinches, or arched openings, in four sides of a square structure.  This architectural form, used extensively in religious architecture after the adoption of Zoroastrianism as the state religion, was continued during the subsequent Islamic era. It was also used in the grandiose palaces at Ctesiphon, Firuzabd, and Sarvestan.  It was during this period that the bas-reliefs on limestone cliffs, including  Bishapur, Naqsh-e Rostam and Naqsh-e Rajab in southern Iran were created.  In 2018, UNESCO added an ensemble of Sassanian historical cities in southern Iran, entitled “Sassanid Archaeological Landscape of Fars Region”, to its World Heritage list.  The Sassanids also practiced h...