Luristan bronzes (rarely "Lorestān", "Lorestāni" etc. in sources in English) are small cast objects decorated with bronze sculpture from the Early Iron Age which have been found in large numbers in Lorestān Province and Kermanshah in western Iran.[1] They include a great number of ornaments, tools, weapons, horse-fittings and a smaller number of vessels including situlae,[2] and those found in recorded excavations are generally found in burials.[3] The ethnicity of the people who created them remains unclear,[4] though they may well have been Iranian, possibly related to the modern Lur people who have given their name to the area. They probably date to between about 1000 and 650 BC.[5]
The bronzes tend to be flat and use openwork, like the related metalwork of Scythian art. They represent the art of a nomadic or transhumant people, for whom all possessions needed to be light and portable, and necessary objects such as weapons, finials (perhaps for tent-poles), horse-harness fittings, pins, cups and small fittings are highly decorated over their small surface area.[6] Representations of animals are common, especially goats or sheep with large horns, and the forms and styles are distinctive and inventive. The "Master of Animals" motif, showing a human positioned between and grasping two confronted animals is common[7] but typically highly stylized.[8] Some female "mistress of animals" are seen.[9]
- ^ "Luristan" remains the usual spelling in art history for the bronzes, as for example in EI, Muscarella, Frankfort, and current museum practice
- ^ Muscarella, 112–113
- ^ Muscarella, 115–116; EI I
- ^ Muscarella, 116–117; EI I
- ^ EI, I
- ^ Frankfort, 343-48; Muscarella, 117 is less confident that they were not settled.
- ^ EI I
- ^ Frankfort, 344-45
- ^ Muscarella, 125–126