Axe with a Feline Head Spitting the Blade
Unknown · c. 1000-800 BC
A feline head with open jaws forms the junction between socket and blade on this bronze axe, so that the cutting edge appears to be spat from its mouth. Behind it four spikes project from the socket. The piece is just under twenty centimetres wide and shows the type in its classic form, less elaborate than the horse-headed axe beside it but built on the same idea.
The Louvre dates it to the beginning of the first millennium BC, around one thousand to eight hundred BC, at the start of the Iron Age in Luristan. The motif of a blade issuing from an animal's mouth is much older in the Near East, going back to Mesopotamian ceremonial weapons of the third millennium BC, and the highland smiths of Iran made it their own. The axe was purchased in nineteen fifty eight and, like its companions, lacks a documented find spot. Seen together, the axes in this case show a workshop tradition playing variations on spikes, ribs and animal heads.
Did You Know? Weapons spat from an animal's mouth were an idea already two thousand years old when this axe was cast.
Unlock the Full Guide
Read every room and listen to every work in all museums with premium.