This paper is a formal description of a fragmentary bas-relief sculpture from Assyria, dated to the reign of Assurbanipal II. The sculpture itself is located in Denver, and depicts an Assyrian "bird-headed deity". The sculpture is described in terms of its salient features, including the dramatic contrast in depth and the extraordinary level of detail, and the paper concludes with a speculation of how such an artifact might have worked within its original ritual context.
Bird-Headed Bas Relief
Balefully staring out from a fragmentary bas-relief panel of mottled grey-brown stone, the bird- or reptile- headed creature dominates this viewer's attention: it is an Assyrian religious carving of some sort, entitled "Bird-Headed Deity," dated to 885 BCE and found in Calah, Iraq. The mottling of the stone is inherent in its quality: to a certain extent, the artist seems to have placed the figure so that the mottling would settle like an aura around the creature's head. What remains of this broken engraving from the reign of Sardanapalus, or Assurbanipal II, the last recorded emperor of Assyria, coheres in the form of a loose and lopsided pentagon -- the shape itself of the broken panel is five-sided, but tilts up toward the right, and looks like home plate at a baseball game seen in extreme perspective. The panel itself is mounted on a concrete square of roughly two feet by two feet in dimension: the actual dimensions of the remaining panel are 19.5 x 21.5 inches. This loose pentagon frames the head and right hand and torso of some sort of bird-headed creature -- also preserved are the creature's elaborate headdress and fringed cape or shawl, most of the left arm, and all of the right arm and what it holds. An ornamental rosette of some sort marks the leftmost corner of the pentagonal fragment: it is impossible to tell what was depicted further, although the direction of the creature's left hand hints that it is offering something to another deity in more elaborate dress, or seated upon a throne.
As far as depth is concerned, the bas relief concentrates on ornate and finely-achieved detail effect, and does not worry too much about elaborate disjunction between the peaks and troughs of the actual carving. This dominates the busier detail-heavy rightmost side of the surviving panel -- the left side is dominated by the creature's eye, beak, and ripplingly muscled right arm, all of which are sculpted with greater attention to physical depth, and the use of contrasting depth as a way of rendering bas-relief more than just a failed painting in stone. As a result the most dramatic leaping-forth from the flat surface is the creature's eye -- followed closely by the contrasts in its beak, especially at the upturned corner of its archaic raptor-smile, and the stylized muscles on the upheld right forearm. These are the points of greatest depth contrast on the surviving sculpture itself: the viewer's sense of three-dimensionality is therefore dominated by the creature's eye, mouth, and strong right arm.
The bird creature's headdress and clothing and left arm appear to be carved all entirely on the same plane, so that the artist may better concentrate on the details of ruffled ribbing -- possibly armor or possibly the ruffle on a ritual garment of some sort -- that go up the thorax in two panels and come down the left arm (which sweeps in front of the figure in one long s-shaped line, presumably to indicate something in the direction of the left hand which is missing from the surviving sculpture). This effect of ruffled ribbing finds visual echo in the creature's headdress and other garments. It would appear that this is intended to be some kind of patterned or detailed cloth, and not armor, as the elbows of the figure seem to depict metal fillets of some sort, perhaps as a mark of hierarchy or sacerdotal status. But it is the level of detail on the creature's garment and headdress that astonish the viewer most: the headdress, which appears to be preserved at least in its general outline if not in its full extent, begins with sharply peaking feathers, each affixed to an ornamental rosette or button. These hang down along a patterned cowl depicted with numerous of these ornamental buttons along the fringes, and the peaked feathers continue almost as a sweeping train or cape down along the creature's back, to where the sculpture cuts off. The creature's head is marked off at the neck by a chunky piece of jewelry, seemingly made up of large shaped stones.
Both left and right sides of the panel make selective use of adorning a more dramatic, depth-oriented style of carving with the meticulous (and presumably time-consuming) attention to detail. As a result, the creature's eye and smile -- the most dramatically elevated portions of the sculpture, which catch light and shadow with particular vividness -- are surrounded by the flat detail heavy patterning, which to a certain degree seems to stand in for scales or feathers. Likewise, the comparatively empty left half of the panel nonetheless reveals the possibility of delicate detail even within dramatic relief-sculpture standout. The upheld right hand, crooked at the wrist, holds a delicately patterned offering of some sort: possibly a pinecone or date palm: the right wrist contains, where a modern arm would have a digital watch, a patterned rosette of three concentric circles. The detail on the rosette is such that it might almost be conceived in as a stand-in for the other eye of the creature, since the creature is seen wholly in profile. Every element of the sculpture is smooth: the background of the bas-relief lies flat and devoid of detail except for the mottling of the stone itself. Even the careful details such as the right-wrist rosette have each element of their construction made in a smooth way: the only roughness comes at the panel's broken edges.
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