quick Facts
Name: Elamite helmet with divine figures
What is this: A bronze helmet with gold decoration
Where is it from: southwest iran
When was it created: Around 1500 to 1100 BC
This unique helmet comes from the Elamite culture, an ancient civilization that flourished in what is now Iran for nearly three millennia. The helmet, possibly worn by a warrior king more than 3,000 years ago, is decorated with a large bird of prey swooping down on three divine figures.
The dome-shaped bronze helmet measures approximately 8.5 inches (21.6 cm) in diameter and has a thin, ridged area at the front that would have gone over the wearer’s eyebrows. Originally, a small projection between them would have extended downwards to cover the wearer’s nose. Sleep-The helmet had silver studs on the sides, and a bronze tube at the rear probably contained a mass of feathers or hair.
helmet, which is in the collection of Metropolitan Museum of ArtWas made by a skilled artisan of Elamite cultureOne of the earliest civilizations of the Ancient Near East. The Elamites lived in what is now southwestern Iran along the eastern Persian Gulf from about 2700 BC until they were conquered. persian empire Elam was often at war with its neighbors in 539 BC. Mesopotamia cities including Ur and babylonAnd archaeologists have found many examples of the culture’s elaborate weapons and armor.
But this particular helmet is a “masterpiece of ancient art” that has “no parallels in representative art or excavations from the ancient Near East,” archaeologists oscar white muscarella written in a 1988 book About Ancient Near Eastern bronze and iron artefacts in The Met’s collection. The unique shape and decoration of this helmet distinguish it from other Elamite armour.
On the front of the helmet are three golden gods: two women and one man. The male god carries a vessel from which water falls, suggesting that he is an Elamite water god. The two identical goddesses wear horned headdresses and jewellery, and they hold their hands raised in prayer posture. A raptor is positioned vertically above the water deity, possibly symbolizing the battlefield bird of prey waiting for victims of the helmet-wearing warrior king, Charles K. wilkinsonThe Curator Emeritus of Near Eastern Art at The Met wrote in a 1965 study Of the object.
The helmet would certainly have been worn by someone of high rank in Elamite culture, both Muscarella and Wilkinson wrote, but it was symbolic as well as functional. Important deities were probably represented to ward off evil and conflict on the ancient battlefield.
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