ICONEA DATABASE OF MIDDLE AND NEAR EASTERN ARCHAEOMUSICOLOGY
Object identity: ic240710-1
Museum identity: Unknown
Origins: Roman, unearthed close to mount Vesuvius
Period: First century AD?
Bibliography: Melini, R., Possessed by the Great Mother: Music and Trance in the Popular Tradition of Southern Italy ICONEA 2008, Pp. 1-9.
IC240710-1
Object identity: IC190710-17
Museum identity: British museum: 1880,0617.1697; BM 91794
Location: British Museum
Object type: Terracotta statuette
Medium: Moulded baked clay with traces of white slip
Excavation site: Babylon
Period: 200BC to 200AD; Seleucid? Parthian?
Description: Two musicians, male and female playing cymbals or clappers and a harp.
Measurements: height: 16.5 centimetres; width: 9 centimetres
Condition: Fair; broken in two pieces, modern repair.
Acquisition date: 1880
Excavated by: Hormuzd Rassam
Exhibition History: Exhibition: “Sulla via di Alessandro da Seleucia al Gandhara”, Torino, 13 February – 27 May 2007; Exhibition: ‘Alexander the Great and the East’, 1997; Iranian Room, case 9/2, 1975.
Bibliography: van Buren E D 1930a cat.1203, p.244, fig.297 (attributed date of 300 BC); Karvonen-Kannas 1995 cat.326, p.160, pl.55; Curtis J E 2000b p.14 (reference to); Rimmer J 1969a pl.XXIII.b; Messina V 2007a pp.202-203, cat.143 (entry by Roberta Menegazzi)
Click on this link for access to the British Museum Database for this object
Object identity: IC190710-19
Museum Identity: British museum: 1895,1205.301
Excavation site: Probably from Nimrud
Period: 8-9th century BC
Measurements: Diameter: 76 millimetres; height: 16 millimetres; weight: 22 grammes
Curatorial notes: Cymbals and clappers are distinguished as follows: cymbals are free-ringing and clappers are dampered. By free-ringing, it is meant that the metal, of which the cymbals are made, is allowed to vibrate freely as it is suspended from a free-floating device allowing for their vibrations to be prolonged (91388 and N 512). Dampered clappers are models which are held by a knob of metal being part of the body of the item and beaten out of the same metal sheet. These are held by the fingers of the player which, as a consequence, dampen the vibrations of the metal since the fingers absorb the vibrations. Free-ringing cymbals resemble their modern counterpart as the lips are flat. This is to allow for the swinging of the one against the other, as is typically done in our modern brass bands. Straight lips would not allow for this playing technique. The brass clappers are of two distinct type: Flat and round knobs. In both types, the body is conical and of about the same size. The flat types have a ring stuck in the knob cavity (N 116 and N 567), secured by a mixture of clay and bitumen, whilst the round knob types (N559, N 560 and N 561) have a strip of copper affixed to the inner part of the body by means of a small copper rivet at each extremity.
IC190710:19
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