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HOME :
Near Eastern Art :
Bactria-Margiana Art : Bactria-Margiana Stone Head from an Idol
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Bactria-Margiana Stone Head from an Idol - OS.221
Origin: Central Asia
Circa: 2500
BC
to 1500
BC
Dimensions:
1.50" (3.8cm) high
Collection: Near Eastern
Medium: Stone
Additional Information: F
£3,000.00
Location: Great Britain
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| Description |
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This piece pertains to an ancient culture
referred to both as
the Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex
(BCAM) or as
the Oxus Civilisation. The Bactria-Margiana
culture spread
across an area encompassing the modern
nations of
Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and
Northern
Afghanistan. Flourishing between about 2100
and 1700 BC,
it was contemporary with the European Bronze
Age, and was
characterised by monumental architecture,
social
complexity and extremely distinctive cultural
artefacts that
vanish from the record a few centuries after
they first
appear. Pictographs on seals have been
argued to indicate
an independently-developed writing system.
It was one of many economic and social
entities in the
vicinity, and was a powerful country due to the
exceptional
fertility and wealth of its agricultural lands. This
in turn gave
rise to a complex and multifaceted set of
societies with
specialist craftsmen who produced luxury
materials such as
this for the ruling and aristocratic elites. Trade
appears to
have been important, as Bactrian artefacts
appear all over
the Persian Gulf as well as in the Iranian
Plateau and the
Indus Valley. For this reason, the area was
fought over from
deep prehistory until the Mediaeval period, by
the armies of
Asia Minor, Greece (Macedonia), India and the
Arab States,
amongst others.
Religion may have been based around deities
represented
by pieces such as this. However, they are
extremely rare. A
2003 inventory calculated that there were at
least thirty-
eight examples of such Bactrian idols known,
and although
the number of examples discovered since has
increased, the
total number of such Bactrian idols remains
relatively small.
Nine examples have been found in south-
eastern
Turkmenistan and two more in Pakistan. Their
significance
is unclear. Some scholars identify them as elite
members of
this early society, while others consider their
compelling
monumentality to signify that these female
figures are
depictions of one (or more) goddesses.
- (OS.221)
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