Axe with Four Long Digitations
Unknown · c. 1000-800 BC
Four long spikes fan out from the socket of this bronze axe, the two in the middle continuing as ribs that run down to meet at the root of the blade. The upper edge of the blade is straight, the lower edge curves in an arc, and the cutting edge stands almost at a right angle to the handle. At twenty six centimetres it is one of the larger axes in the case, and its lines are unusually elegant.
The axe belongs to the Luristan tradition of western Iran and dates to the early first millennium BC, around one thousand to eight hundred BC. It came to the Louvre as a gift in nineteen thirty six together with its neighbour, and the two show how a single basic form, the spiked axe, could be varied in the length and spread of the spikes. Bronzes of this quality were found in cemeteries of the Zagros mountains, buried with warriors and horsemen, and were looted in huge numbers in the nineteen twenties and thirties before controlled excavations began. The attribution to Luristan rests on style.
Did You Know? The spikes fan out like the fingers of an open hand, which is exactly what the French word for them, digitations, means.
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