Scabbard Tip

Description This ornament once decorated the tip of a sword's scabbard. In a relief carved on a wall of the palace of the Achaemenid king Darius I (reigned 522-486 BC), a man is depicted wearing a scabbard with a nearly identical tip. The design derives from an image of a lion attacking an ibex.

Provenance The Merrin Gallery, New York [date and mode of acquisition unknown]; Walters Art Museum, 1999, by purchase.

Credit Museum purchase with funds provided by the Ancient Art Acquistion Fund, 1999