Parthian Terracotta Vessel with Deer Head

Culture: Parthian

Period: Late 1st millennium B.C.

Material: Terracotta

Dimensions: 21.2 cm high

Price: Sold

Ref: 6546

Provenance: Swiss collection Hans Zellweger (1916-2000), acquired in the 1970s from Elie Borowski. Thence in a family estate.

Condition: Head and ears reattached, otherwise very beautifully preserved.

Description: Large terracotta vessel of red-light clay with a corpus of two bulbous forms, with an estuary spout on top at the connecting point. The back semi-circular with a small stubby tail on top. The massive front corpus with a semi-spherical bulge on the chest. Towards the top a long, tapering neck which merges into a modelled deer head. The deer with raised, large ears, round, bulging eyes and a cylindrical snout with an engraved mouth. The vessel is in the tradition of the well-known Amlash rhytons, which are around 700 years older and came back in the Parthian period as zoomorphic vessels. See for the type the vessel in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York with a deer- (Accession Number 60.611) and a rabbit head (Accession Number 1988.102.30) respectively. For the double spherical corpus also see the vessel with Christie’s with a horse head, auctioned on 13 June 2000 in New York, lot 503.