Persian, bronze, ceremonial plumed head, 7 inches, approx 1000 BC.

I hope this image works......

Oh well, that didn't work, I'll try to have one of my kids take a pic and post it when they get home.

Trying again....

Thats interesting. Tell us more about it. History and were does one find one for sale.

Tat is very nice.

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Originally posted by J_Zola:
Thats interesting. Tell us more about it. History and were does one find one for sale.

Afa history of its usage, that is lost to the ages. Also, based on it's patina, which is not as obvious in my relatively poor pic, it was almost certainly "dug" at some time in the past. How long ago that was is unknown, it could be last century or several before that. These items have been collected for millenia, the Romans were heavy collectors of Greek art, in its various forms, for example. BTW, the black "handle" is just a stand/display piece made for it at some time in the past. It is called a "ceremonial" ax head because it apparently wasn't sharpened, and thus likely was used for state or religious occasions as opposed to actual cutting or weapons use. I also wouldn't expect a "using" weapon to have the plumes or spikes (although maybe?). It came from a well known collector's sale (although not directly, someone bought it and resold it in this one) who bought it from Antiquarium Ltd (still in business at 948 Madison Ave) in NYC in 1987. I bought it out of a world coin sale that had both modern which basically means anything in the last 700 years or so, and ancient coins(Greek, Roman, Judean, etc) in it, along with a few pieces of antiquities. This was one of them. I thought it was neat as hell, so I bid on it and was "lucky" (or dumb) enough to get it while adding a few coins to my not so modest collection. Whether it's worth what I paid, I dunno, but I'm only a hundred bucks (plus 15% buyer's premium) more into it than the next fool bidding on it.

This type of item can be found in antiquity sales/auctions but you have to look for them (Sotheby's, Christie's, Bonham's, Heritage, etc) as well as high end shops that deal in antiquities such as the prior mentioned Antiquarium Ltd. These are more common in Europe, but one has to be a knowledgeable buyer over there for several reasons. With the antiquity laws these days, one has to be very careful. They (the Feds) just arrested an eminent hand surgeon in NY for trying to sell (at a very public auction) a couple of very valuable (a couple of million dollars worth at a minimum) ancient coins he had collected. Allegedly, at least one of them was not legally exported or possibly looted. Based on reading the reports without any personal knowledge of the facts, it sounds like he's in seriously deep poo to me but I doubt he'll do any time given his position and resources AND the Feds have to prove their case, which may not be easy. Of course, losing a couple of million dollars worth of coins ain't chicken feed. Shades of the US 1933 20s!!

Interesting...Gato.

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antiquity laws

Great read Gato. You are spot on concerning the antiquity laws. You can't be too carful.