| Description (summary) |
0000-00-00 |
mKB |
Three rope impressions are preserved as well as the flat portion next to the wood of the door; the peg impression is also preserved. The clay is tempered with some chaff and suprisingly large pebbles; one pebble is 3.5 mm. and another on the surface is 5.5 mm. across. Parts of three rollings are preserved. Design: A rearing lion is being attacked by a human with skirt tucked up in front holding a dagger with large pummel. Behind this figure is a standing bull(?) with a screw type tail. The complete seal was at least 1.8cm high. In the Mozan door sealings we have represented combat between nude heroes and rampant animals as well as a figure with a skirt which is turned up in the front. These figures are well known on Early Dynastic glyptic at least from ED I1 on. They can interchange roles to the extent that either the nude or the skirted figures can wield the large dagger that appears also in these scenes. See for example Amiet 1961, 891, a Fara style seal, showing a man with an open skirt in the same position as our seal; in addition he is also associated with an animal behind him (in this case rearing, not standing). Other examples of these figures occur with minor variations, e.g. Buchanan 1981, 247 (on this ED I1 seal the nude belted hero with upstanding hair, straight but not tufted, holds the dagger, not the skirted figure as in the M o m seal). In Porada 1948, P1. XIV:85, there is a man in a short kilt with a dagger threatening a rearing lion; see also No. 86 on the same plate. These figures are also associated with the nude hero with hair in upstanding tufts in i29. The skirt of the Mozan figure is found on ED I1 style cylinder seals, Frankfort 1955, P1. 46:489, and Amiet 1961, PI. 672391; the servant behind the main male figure is wearing one of these skirts as seen also on the ED I Kudurru of Ushumgal in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (Amiet 1980, Nos. 301, 303). The screw type tail on the bull is paralleled by an ED I1 seal in which a bull man has a similar tail (see Strommenger 1964, P1. 42:bottom). The same figure with an upturned skirt can be seen in another Moan door sealing (i52), holding a plant motif in one outstretched hand, and what appears to be.a pole with a bag hanging from it over a standing homed animal; this theme appears to be unique. The style of the carving on the M o m impression can be dated to ED 111. While the theme started earlier and continues into the beginning of the Akkadian period it does not appear to be popular in the Akkadian period and in any case is not exactly the same as ours. [Input: ZJ226_rL_si.j] |