Ancient Near Eastern Art: The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, v ...
Ancient Near Eastern Art: The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, v ...
Ancient Near Eastern Art: The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, v ...
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In antiquity the many mountain ranges <strong>of</strong><br />
the <strong>Near</strong> East, including the Taurus <strong>of</strong><br />
eastern Turkey, the Zagros <strong>of</strong> western<br />
Iran, and the Caucasus between the<br />
Black and Caspian seas, were rich in<br />
metallic ores. At seventh-millennium B.C.<br />
sites such as Cayonu, Tell Ramad, and<br />
Ali Kosh the earliest stages <strong>of</strong> metalworking<br />
technology are documented.<br />
Toward the end <strong>of</strong> the fourth millennium<br />
B.C., the burgeoning urban centers<br />
in the lowlands began to demand metals<br />
to make objects for the ruling elite and for<br />
the growing temple complexes. By this<br />
time, the basic properties <strong>of</strong> some nonferrous<br />
metals-especially copper, gold,<br />
silver, and lead-were understood. It was<br />
known, for example, that the shape <strong>of</strong><br />
metal could be altered by heating it to a<br />
liquid state, pouring it into a mold, and<br />
letting it cool and harden. Metals were<br />
also shaped by alternately hammering<br />
and heating them in a process now called<br />
annealing. <strong>Art</strong>isans had learned as well<br />
-probably by trial and error-that when<br />
some metals are mixed in their liquid<br />
state, they combine to form a metallic<br />
alloy, a new material that is <strong>of</strong>ten, when<br />
liquid, more fluid and, when cool, harder<br />
than its components.<br />
<strong>The</strong> properties <strong>of</strong> meltability, malleability,<br />
and miscibility are the basis <strong>of</strong> two<br />
<strong>of</strong> the most important techniques <strong>of</strong> ancient<br />
metalworking-hammering and<br />
casting. Hammering was used to make<br />
or to finish all kinds <strong>of</strong> objects. Vessels,<br />
such as the elaborately decorated one<br />
(fig. 62) from Luristan, were made entirely<br />
by hammering. <strong>The</strong> shape was<br />
formed by raising or sinking the bronze-a<br />
copper-and-tin alloy-by hammer blows.<br />
This particular vessel was made in two<br />
parts, joined in the middle by bronze<br />
rivets. Six registers <strong>of</strong> birds, trees, and<br />
horned and striding animals were hammered<br />
up from the vessel's surface in the<br />
repousse technique. <strong>The</strong> bodies were<br />
then elaborately decorated with chased<br />
lines created by a dull tool that, when<br />
struck, pushed the metal to either side.<br />
Gold is a s<strong>of</strong>t metal, easily worked by<br />
hammering. A western Iranian trapezoidal<br />
plaque <strong>of</strong> the first millennium B.C. (fig.<br />
64) was made in the same way as<br />
60 6<br />
44<br />
62