An carved softwood head of Suleiman - image-1

Lot 1505 Dα

An carved softwood head of Suleiman

Auction 1174 - overview Cologne
04.06.2021, 12:00 - Decorative Arts
Estimate: 3.000 € - 5.000 €
Result: 3.750 € (incl. premium)
Print page
Watchlist

An carved softwood head of Suleiman

Life-sized bust, painted in colours on the front and black on the reverse. With painted glass eyes and an iron hook affixed to the back of the head from a former mounting. With a wide crack to the back of the head and neck. H ca. 32 cm.
Attributed to Italy, 17th / 18th C.

The head portrays the 10th Ottoman sultan, Suleyman I the Magnificent (ca. 1494 - 1566). Under Suleyman's rule, the Ottoman Empire reached its greatest expansion. Having already conquered Hungary, his army of over 120,000 men besieged Vienna on September 27th 1529. In the 16th century, there were few heads more capable of impressing contemporaries, for better or worse, than his.
The incision in the neck indicates that the head was movable, and could nod. It presumably originally belonged to a life-size robed figure.