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Decorated Assyrian Knob-Plates in the British Museum

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Pauline Albenda
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Extract

This article deals with a class of shaped clay fragments, previously unpublished, taken from several Assyrian sites in the nineteenth century and now kept in the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities of the British Museum. The individual fragments belong to knob-plates originally designed for attachment to the wall surface. In addition to the fragments of plates, the ceramic assemblage includes several large wall pegs whose knobs in shape resemble those of the plates. Glazed polychrome decoration occurs on the individual pieces and consists of floral patterns and geometrical and plain bands. Although the repertoire of ornamental motifs is limited, whole designs reconstructed from the plate fragments reveal a variety of fourfold symmetrical arrangements (see below). Three distinctive ornamental styles are evident on the British Museum pieces and, further, each style derives from a different site. Thus, several ceramic workshops manufactured the clay architectural fixtures that originally embellished select edifices. Cuneiform inscriptions preserved on several plate and peg pieces disclose that the date of manufacture for the entire assemblage is in the reign of Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 B.C.). See Appendix A.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 53 , 1991 , pp. 43 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1991

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References

1 Dr. John E. Curtis, Keeper of the Department of Western Asiatic Antiquities, British Museum, kindly allowed me to study the ceramic collection. I thank members of the Department for their assistance on matters dealing with the collection, and I must mention Peter Rea and Helen Dianne Rowan. I also thank Dr. Julian E. Reade for checking the documentation of the numbering system of the knobbed plates and pegs. Photographs of the ceramic pieces were made by the Photographic Service and are published by permission of the Trustees of the British Museum. Drawings are by the author.

2 Andrae, W., Coloured Ceramics from Ashur and Earlier Ancient Assyrian Wall Paintings, (London, 1925), 65, Fig. 35Google Scholar. Moorey, P. R. S., Materials and Manufacture in Ancient Mesopotamia: the Evidence of Archaeology and Art, BAR International Series 237, (Oxford, 1985), 178–9Google Scholar. An illustrated survey of decorated wall attachments (sikkatu) appears in Nunn, A., Die Wandmalerei und der glasierte Wandschmuck im Alten Orient, Handbuch der Orientalisk 6 (1987), 160–3Google Scholar. In the present article, the term “knob-plate” is used to distinguish this class of ceramic wares from terracotta plaques which show figural subjects in relief and ceramic tiles which are rectangular or square in shape.

3 A substantial assemblage of whole and fragmentary knob-plates with decoration was recovered at Ashur; see Andrae, ibid., 65–73. The use of knob-plates in western Iran, in the first millennium B.C., is also documented. See: Moorey, ibid., 179; de Schauensee, M., “Northern Iran as a Bronze Working Centre: the View from Hasanlu,” in Curtis, J. (ed.), Bronze-working Centres of Western Asia c. 1000-539 B.C., (London, 1988), 49, Pl. 18Google Scholar; Heim, S., “Glazed Architectural Elements in Elam and Related Material from Luristan”. PhD dissertation, New YorkUniversity Institute of Fine Arts, 1989 (unpublished)Google Scholar.

4 Layard, A. H., Nineveh and its Remains, vol. 1 (New York, 1849), 52, 63Google Scholar, end map; idem, Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon, (London, 1853), 133–4; idem, A Second Series of the Monuments of Nineveh, (London, 1853), Pl. 55, nos. 2, 3, 8.

5 Layard, , Nineveh and Babylon, 165–7Google Scholar; idem, Nineveh and its Remains, vol. 2, 278–9. Layard did reproduce an inscribed clay vessel fragment, decorated with yellow lines and a garland similar to the Ba'shiqa-type. Its findspot is given as the Northwest Palace, Nimrud. Idem, A Second Series…, Pl. 54, no. 10.

6 Layard, , Nineveh and Babylon, 277Google Scholar. Other small finds included fragments of bricks with “arrow-headed characters painted in yellow with white outline, upon a pale green ground”. The site has been re-excavated; among the discoveries were numerous glazed wares, including two undecorated round knob-plate fragments. See: Mahmoud, A., “Tall 'Aǧāǧa 1982”, and “Tell 'Aǧāǧa 1984”, Archiv für Orientforschung 31 (1985): 112–14Google Scholar; Mahmoud, et al., “Die Ausgrabung auf dem Teil 'Aǧāǧa/Šadikanni, 1982”, Damaszener Mitteilungen 3 (1988): 180–4, Fig. 14Google Scholar.

7 Layard's use of the term, “scrollwork0, meant a garland of some kind. For his discussion of Assyrian garland ornaments, see Nineveh and its Remains, vol. 2, 231–4Google Scholar.

8 Rassam, H., Asshur and the Land of Nimrod, (Cincinnati, 1897), 225–6Google Scholar.

9 Pottier, E., Catalogue des antiquités assyriennes, (Paris, 1924), 146–7, Pl. 32, nos. 191–2Google Scholar. Dr. Annie Gaubet, Conservateur en Chef, Department des Antiquités Orientales, Musée du Louvre, kindly furnished the photographs of the fragments reproduced in the present article.

10 The British expedition at Nimrud did not re-excavate the building, since only a hollow in the ground and some stone remnants were left of the temple. Mallowan, M. E. L., Nimrud and its Remains, vol. 1 (London, 1966), 92Google Scholar.

11 Curtis, J., “Assyria as a Bronzeworking Centre in the Late Assyrian Period”, in Bronzeworking Centres of Western Asia, 88Google Scholar; Moorey, , Materials and Manufacture, 34Google Scholar.

12 Pegs inscribed with that king's name were found at Ashur; see Andrae, W., Die Festungswerke von Assur, WVDOG 23 (1913), Pls. 51–3Google Scholar. On two examples, the knob head is a poor imitation of the Ashurnasirpal-type (nos. 10237, 11390).

13 The excavator described clay fragments of similar shape as belonging to pottery. Hall, H. R., A Season's Work at Ur, Al 'Ubaid, Abu Sharatn (Eridu), and Elsewhere, (London, 1930), 183–4Google Scholar.

14 British Museum numbers 91679–90 appear in the 1908 catalogue of the museum, and the painted fragments are described as “ceiling-ornaments with bosses”. British Museum, A Guide to the Babylonian and Assyrian Antiquities. Second rev. ed., (London, 1908), 111Google Scholar.

15 N 2034 is actually a small piece broken off from a polychrome glazed brick, showing portions of three white petals. This fragment, marked with the registry number, is now kept in the storeroom.

16 An early photograph showing the fitted fragments appears in a catalogue of plates, British Museum, Assyrian Antiquities, Part 3 (London, 1872), Pl. 575Google Scholar; for the text, see British Museum, Catalogue of a Series of Photographs, from the Collection in the British Museum, Part 3 (London, 1872), 46, no. 575Google Scholar. The photographer was Stephen Thompson. A line drawing made from the photograph appears in Perrot, G. and Chipiez, C., A History of Art in Chaldaea and Assyria, vol. 1 (London, 1884), Fig. 128Google Scholar.

17 The fitted fragments appear in the same photograph published in 1872; see British Museum, Museum Antiquities, Pl. 575. The photograph proves that the discovery of the glazed pieces from Arban (Tell Ajaja) predates Rassam's excavations at Nimrud. For a line drawing made from the photograph, see Perrot and Chipiez, ibid., Fig. 127.

18 For technical information pertaining to ceramic wares in modern times and in antiquity in the Near East, reference is made to Rosenthal, E., Pottery and Ceramics. From Common Brick to Fine China, rev. ed. (London, 1954)Google Scholar; Moorey, , Materials and Manufacture, 165–6, 177–9, 182–8Google Scholar.

19 See the laboratory analysis of the fabrics and glazes by I. C Freestone published below.

20 At Khorsabad, wall pegs were found in situ on a wall of the Nabu Temple. Loud, G. and Altman, C., Khorsabad Part II. The Citadel and the Town, Oriental Institute Publications 40 (1938), 42–3, Pl. 15 A–CGoogle Scholar.

21 At Khorsabad, wall paintings represent knob-plates only. Coloured Ceramics, 65.

22 Ibid., Fig. 42, left.

23 Ibid., Fig. 39, right.

24 The only building excavated in the temple precinct was the Temple of Mamu; see Oates, J., “Balawat: Recent Excavations and a New Gate”, in Harper, P. O. and Pittman, H. (eds.), Essays on Near Eastern Art and Archaeology in Honor of Charles Kyrle Wilkinson, (New York, 1983), 40–2, Figs. 1-3Google Scholar.

25 Dayton, J., Minerals, Metals, Glazing and Man: or Who was Sesostris I?, (London, 1978), Fig. 338Google Scholar. Statements made in the text should be treated with caution; for example, the glazed brick illustrated in Fig. 337, 374, probably dates to the late eighth century B.C., based upon style and the triple-stemmed plants held by the genies.

26 Registry number MMA 58.31.29 (excavation no. BT 154). Presented in 1958 by the British School of Archaeology in Iraq through the Rogers Fund. Height 8.3 cm. Diameter of knob head, 6.5 cm. Dr. Prudence O. Harper, Curator of the Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art, Metropolitan Museum of Art, kindly allowed me to examine and publish this fragment.

27 The fragments were found on the surface of the main mound at Balawat, about 8 meters apart, during the first season of excavations by the British Museum expedition to Nimrud and Balawat. Dr. John E. Curtis was the Director of the expedition, and Dr. Dominique Collon was Deputy Director. The register details of the two fragments are as follows:

BT89/2, Corner of glazed wall plaque with chevron motif, palmette design and cuneiform inscription in white, yellow and blackish-brown paint. L. 10.8 cm. Ht. 7.5 cm. Thickness 1.85 cm. The cuneiform inscription reads:

]KUR Aš-ma

of the land] of Aššur (am I).

BT89/19, Fragment of glazed wall plaque as BT 89/2. L. 6.2 cm. Ht. 6.0 cm. Thickness 1.75 cm.

I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Curtis for providing the information cited above, and for his permission to publish the fragments.

28 Andrae, , Coloured Ceramics, Pls. 31, 32Google Scholar.

29 Among the plates from Ashur are several whose designs combine chevroned guilloches and Ba'shiqa-type garlands. Ibid. Fig. 39, left.

30 The ninth century B.C. Assyrian kings, Adad-Nirari II, Tukulti-Ninurta II and Ashurnasirpal II, passed through Arban (ancient Shadikanni), during their journeys along the Habur River. The last two kings used the city as an overnight halting place. Assyrian royal building works may have already taken place in the reign of Ashurnasirpal II. For the textual study of the royal itineraries, see Russell, H. F., “The Historical Geography of the Euphrates and Habur according to the Middle and Neo-Assyrian Sources”, Iraq 47 (1985): 65–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

31 Andrae, , Coloured Ceramics, 71, Pl. 33aGoogle Scholar. The cone motif on several plates (e.g. Andrae, ibid., Fig. 48, center) relates to late eighth–early seventh century B.C. types; stylistically similar cone motifs occur on pavement slabs of the same period. See Albenda, P., “Assyrian Carpets in Stone”, Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society of Columbia University 10 (1978): 7–8, Pls. 14–18, 24–6Google Scholar. Another type of knob-plate decoration that should be mentioned, is raised relief. An Assyrian fragmentary example, discovered at Nippur, has a rosette on the knob head and a guilloche near the outer rim. Gibson, McG., Zettler, A., Armstrong, J., “The Southern Corner of Nippur: Excavations during the 14th and 15th Seasons”, Sumer 37 (1983): 187, 189, Fig. 30Google Scholar.