Basin Handle with Lion and Snake Heads

This curving basin handle is decorated with the heads of snakes, lions, and a rosette. The handle is U-shaped and has splayed ends (1). It would have been matched by one to three more handles that would have been spaced equally around the basin. There is a flattened terminal on each side, where the handle would have attached to the rim of the basin, with the head of a snake on the exterior point and the head of a lion on the interior. The snakes have deeply inset points for eyes and a V-shape with a central line on top of each head. The underside of the snake heads is flat. The lion heads also have deeply inset eyes. Their noses and mouths are molded, with whiskers indicated. Short horizontal locks of hair on the back of the heads represent manes. The heads would have overlapped the basin rim and looked into the interior. The top of the handle between the lion heads is facetted. At the midpoint, a knob rises up with an eight-petal rosette, rendered with double lines on the top (2 cm diameter, 0.4 cm thick). The edge of the top of the knob is decorated with a herringbone pattern. The underside of the handle is round, featureless, and smooth. NOTES: 1. A similar handle is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, inv. no. 1998.26. For another basin handle with a similar decorative scheme (a central rosette flanked by lion and snake heads) executed in a different style, compare W. Gauer, Die Bronzegefässe von Olympia: Mit Ausnahme der geometrischen Dreifüsse und der Kessel des orientalisierenden Stils, Olympische Forschungen 20 (Berlin, 1991) 240, no. P 27, pl. 62.2. For the possible shape of the basin the handle might have belonged to, see Gauer 1991 (supra), fig. 2, no. 24 (P34). Lisa M. Anderson