Lot 689
CARVED MARBLE URN
EASTERN MEDITERREAN, POSSIBLY BYZANTINE
Auction: Day One: 14 March 2012 From 10am
Description
CARVED MARBLE URN
EASTERN MEDITERREAN, POSSIBLY BYZANTINE
probably adapted from a capital or font, the exterior of the bowl carved with frieze of lions, birds, other beasts and acanthus between vine, over stiff carved acanthus base, on later cylindrical column and square base
91cm diameter, 97cm high overall
Footnote
Note: The carving of the acanthus at the base is reminiscent of that
on Byzantine capitals found along the Aegean coast, notably examples dating from around 450-70 at Corinth-Lechaion and Nea-Anchialos, illustrated in Richard Krautheimer, Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture, 1986, p123 and 133. This piece was collected by Captain William Fordyce Blair, who served with the Royal Navy in the Mediterranean in the early 19th century. He saw action around the Peloponnese during the Greek War of Independence, notably at the Battle of Navarino (1827) and at the taking of Morea Castle (1828), where he was mentioned in dispatches for his gallantry.