Decorative Plaque: Ram-Headed Sphinxes Flanking a Sacred Tree

900–800 BCE

Phoenicia, Iraq, Nimrud

Medium

ivory

Measurements

Overall: 15.1 x 9 x 1.1 cm (5 15/16 x 3 9/16 x 7/16 in.)

Credit Line

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund 1968.47

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Location

102A Ancient Near East

Description

This small plaque was executed in the Phoenician style with symmetrical compositions, elongated figural proportions, and Egyptian subjects and motifs. Examples have been found throughout the Middle East, but thousands come from Nimrud where most were excavated in the storerooms of a military arsenal built by King Shalmaneser II (858-824 bc). When the Nimrud palace was sacked in the 7th century bc, these ivories were thrown into a well, where Sir Max Mallowan (the husband of Agatha Christie) discovered them in 1951. The monumental wall relief (1943.246) was found at the same Assyrian palace at Nimrud.