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Three Iron Swords from Luristan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

K. R. Maxwell-Hyslop  and
H. W. M. Hodges
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Extract

None of the three swords to be discussed has a precise provenance. The first sword is the property of R. T. Clough Esq., and was kindly lent to us for examination; the second was bought through dealers and is now the property of the Institute of Archaeology, University of London; the third was kindly given to the Institute of Archaeology by G. Nazar Esq., to whom we would like here to record our sincere thanks.

Our purpose will be to discuss the techniques by which these swords were made; to consider their relationships with one another, and to suggest a chronological framework which can be used for dating similar Iranian iron weapons.

Although heavily corroded this sword is essentially complete insofar as the metallic part is concerned, measuring 52·5 cms. from pommel to point. The blade can best be described as having the outline of a willow-leaf, with its maximum width, 3 cms., rather more than a third of its length from the hilt. Down the centre of the blade on both faces is a wide flattened mid-rib, tapering at the point.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1966 , pp. 164 - 176
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1966

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References

1 Damien, R., in Revue Archéologique (1962), pp. 17–41Google Scholar; Godard, A., in (2) Ars Asiatica 17 (1931) pp. 40, 41Google Scholar, in (b) Athar-é-Iran 3 (1938), pp. 233–263Google Scholar, Herzfeld, E., Iran in the Ancient East, London; 1941, p. 135Google Scholar; Lefferts, Kate C., in A.J.A. 68 (1964), pp. 52–62Google Scholar; Maryon, H., in A.J.A. 65 (1961) pp. 173–184Google Scholar; Naumann, M. F. K., in Archiv für das Eisenbüttenwesen 9 (1957)Google Scholar; Speleers, L., in Bull, Mus. Roy. d'Art et d'Histoire 5 (1933), p. 111Google Scholar; Ternbach, J., Dark Ages and Nomads, Ed. Dyson, R. H., Istanbul, 1964, pp. 46–51Google Scholar.

2 Especially the note by R. M. Organ in Maryon, op. cit., pp. 177, 178.

3 Copenhagen Museum, No. 14651. The sword is 57·5 cms. long.

4 Copenhagen Museum, No. 14652. The sword is 60·0 cms. long.

5 Graeffe Collection No. 55. The sword is 45·2 cms. long.

6 Ternbach, op. cit., pl. XIII, No. 3.

7 Ternbach, op. cit., pl. XIII, No. 5.

8 Ternbach, op. cit., pl. XIII, No. 3 and p. 49. We assume the term “raising” here to be used in a non-technological sense.

9 Ternbach, op. cit., p. 49.

10 We would like to thank Professor K. de B. Codrington for this observation.

11 Foroughi Collection. Sept mille ans d'art en Iran, No. 186. The sword is 56·5 cms. long. The fact that one of the applied lions has broken away allows one to see exactly how the fitting was carried out.

12 Damien, R., op. cit., p. 27; Maryon, op. cit., p. 184; Naumann, op. cit., p. 78; Ternbach, op. cit., p. 51; Godard, op. cit., (b), p. 251.

13 Ternbach, op. cit., p. 50.

14 R. Damien, op. cit., p. 22, quoting E. Salin. For photographs of the relief and a cast see E. Akurgal, The Art of the Hittites, pls. 82, 83.

15 The carnelian-inlaid lions on the guard of the sword in the Metropolitan Museum (Lefferts, op. cit. footnote 1, Plate 23) can be compared with the frit lioness from Choga Zanbil (Ghirshman, in Act. Arch. Scien. Hung. 11 (1959), fig. 9Google Scholar); with the agate lion from the foundation deposit of the temple of Inshushinak at Susa (de Mecquenem, R. in M.D.P. 7 (1905), plate Xin, No. 13Google Scholar; with the terracotta lions from Nuzi, Starr, R. F. S., Nuzi (1937), pls. 109, 110, 111Google Scholar; and with the bronze lions, cast on iron pins, typical of Hasanlu IV (Dyson, R., J.N.E.S. 24 (1965), fig. 6BGoogle Scholar. The distinctive feature of well-defined ribs across the forehead, behind the ears, and across the paws of the lions on the guard of the sword in the Metropolitan Museum can be found on the Yazili Kaya “dagger’-god, and also on the stone lions from Alaca, Malatya and Carchemish (E. Akurgal, Spaethetithische Bildkunst, Taf. B, 2, Taf. 1, and Abb 30, 33). The lions on the pommel of the sword in the Metropolitan Museum can be compared with those on North Syrian steatite bowls rather than with the Hasanlu “Egyptian blue” example (Barnett, R. D. in B.M.Q. 27 (1963), p. 31, pl. XXXIGoogle Scholar, e: Loon, Van in Expedition 4, 4 (1962)Google Scholar: Muscarella in Archaeology 18 (1965), p. 41Google Scholar). For bronze standards with human heads between two lions see E. Porada in Dyson, op. cit., footnote 28, pl. III, No. 4 and pl. IV.

16 King, L. W., Babylonian Boundary Stones and Memorial Tablets in the British Museum (1912), p. 19, plate XXIXGoogle Scholar. See also der Waerden, B. L. Van, “History of the Zodiac’ in A.f.O. 16, pp. 216ffGoogle Scholar. PA-BIL-SAG, later associated with the goddess of Isin, equated with Ninurta. We are grateful to Miss B. Parker for information on this point. For the bearded heads on the swords cf. the bronze statuette in Teheran, Parrot, A., Nineveh and Babylon, p. 127 and pl. 147Google Scholar; the sherd from Sialk, Cemetery B, Ghirshman, R., Fouilles de Sialk, II, pl. X, No. 5Google Scholar; the painted face-vase from Brak, Mallowan, M. E. L.Twenty-five Years of Mesopotamian Discovery, fig. 15, p. 37Google Scholar; and the heads at the base of the chariot standards on a relief of Ashurnasirpal II, Layard, A., Monuments of Nineveh, I, pl. 23Google Scholar. For the treatment of the beards cf. a bronze figure published by Erlenmeyer, M.-L. and Erlenmeyer, H., Iranica Antiqua 5 (1965), Taf. II, 10, and p. 7Google Scholar. For a combination of human and animal heads see the bronze axe-hammer published by Deshayes, J. in Syria 35 (1958), Plate XXIICrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 Maxwell-Hyslop, K. R., Iraq 8 (1946), p. 15, type 32CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Many additions could now be made to this preliminary list. See also, Maleki, Y. in Iranica Antiqua 4 (1964), plate XI, No. 2Google Scholar.

18 Baghdad Museum, DK.120.

19 Smith, S., B.M.Q..11 (1937), p. 6o, pl. XXI, No. 7Google Scholar. Mallowan, M. E. L., Iraq 4 (1942), p. 135, fig. 13, No. 5Google Scholar. See also Iraq 8 (1946), p. 15, type 12Google Scholar.

20 Maxwell-Hyslop, K. R., Iraq 18 (1956), p. 162, plate XXXIV, Nos. 1 and 2CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 Maxwell-Hyslop, K. R., Iraq 8 (1946), type 35CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 Nagel, W., “Die Königsdolche der Zweiten Dynastie von Isin,” in A.f.O. 19 (1959–1960), pp. 94ffGoogle Scholar.

23 Vor- und Frügeschichte Museum. W. Nagel, op. cit. Abb. 9. The inscription reads (1) ša eri-ba- dnusku (2) ṭup-šar-ri (3) ša dMarduk iram-mu (4) la i-ta-bal-šu. ‘Dedicated by Eriba-Nusku the scribe. He whom Marduk loves shall not take it away.’ An even better parallel to the iron swords in Brussels and Copenhagen is a bronze weapon in the British Museum (BM 122932). B.M.Q. 6 (1931), pl. XXXaGoogle Scholar. An area immediately below the guard seems to have been prepared for an inscription but it was either never made or has been destroyed. (See Plate XLIX, 1).

24 British Museum No. 123060. B.M.Q. 7 (1932), p. 45, plate XVIIIGoogle Scholar.

25 British Museum No. 123061 and Iraq 26 (1964), pl. XII, 5Google Scholar.

26 Royal Ontario Museum of Archaeology, Toronto. B.A.S.O.R. 74 (1939), pp. 7ff. and fig. 1Google Scholar.

27 Ternbach Collection. Nagel, op. cit., Abb. 7.

28 Dyson, R. H., Dark Ages and Nomads (1964), p. 35 and fig. 2, Nos. 2 and 3Google Scholar.

29 Dyson, op. cit. p. 39.

30 Melgaard, J., et. al. “Excavations at Tepe Guran” in Act. Arch. 34 (1963), p. 129, fig. 31Google Scholar.

31 Dyson, op. cit. p. 33, fig. 1, No. 4.

32 Schaeffer, C. F. A., Stratigraphie Comparée et Chronologie de l'Asie Occidentale (1948), fig. 44, No. 6Google Scholar.

33 Louvre. Nagel, op. cit., Abb. 1.

34 Unfortunately we have been unable to examine the sword in the Foroughi Collection (footnote 11). From photographs it is quite clear that the lions on the guard were of iron, while at the same time the bronze “leafing” may well have been cast-on as a very thin layer over the underlying iron. If so, this is a curiously elaborate technique since all the decorative motifs could have been cast-on solid over an un-decorated iron hilt. Indeed, this was the method later followed by the makers of iron and bronze maceheads (Birmingham, J. in A.S. 11 (1961), p. 187, figs. 7–10Google Scholar), and the damaged macehead (fig. 9) shows clearly how all the decoration in bronze was cast-on over a simple, hollow iron knob. If the bronze “leafing” on the sword from the Foroughi collection is in fact cast-on, one can only conclude that the technique was in an experimental stage.

35 Herzfeld, op. cit., footnote 1, p. 158.

36 Maryon, op. cit., footnote 1, p. 175, and Ternbach, op. cit., p. 47.

37 Budge, E. A. W. and King, L. W., The Annals of the Kings of Assyria (1902), p. 85, Col. VI, 66Google Scholar.

38 Deshayes, Jean, Les outils de bronze de l'Indus au Danube, I, p. 432Google Scholar, and Schaeffer, C. F.-A., Ugaritica, I, p. 116fGoogle Scholar.

39 Starr, R. F. S., Nuzi (1937), plate 125Google Scholar.

40 Ghirshman, R., Iraq 22 (1960), pp. 210ffCrossRefGoogle Scholar. and Iranica Antiqua 2 (1962), pp. 11ffGoogle Scholar.

41 Smith, S. in Professor Poure Davoud, Memorial Volume 11, Bombay, 1951, pp. 62–77Google Scholar.