page_title: Ancient South Arabian art
section_title: Sculpture
hierarchical_section_title: Ancient South Arabian art / Sculpture
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Stèle funéraire; bande supérieure: scène de banquet avec trois personnes; bande inférieure: conducteur de chameau avec deux chameaux. Inscription sabéenne: "Image et monument funéraire de` Iglum, fils de Sa`adīllāt de Qaryot. Que l'Orient «Athtar frappe quiconque le détruira». Albâtre, 1er-3ème siècles après JC. De l'Arabie du Sud.- H. 55 cm (21 ½ in.), W. 29 cm (11 ¼ in.), D. 8 cm (3 in.). Musée Louvre-Lens à Lens, Pas-de-Calais, Hauts-de-France,France.
context_page_description: Ancient South Arabian art was the art of the Pre-Islamic cultures of the southern Arabian peninsula, which was produced from the 3rd millennium BC until the 7th century AD.
context_section_description: The most remarkable artworks aside from architecture from pre-Islamic South Arabia are sculptures. In addition to bronze (and occasionally gold and silver), limestone was a common material for sculptures, especially alabaster and marble. Typical features of ancient South Arabian sculpture are cubic base forms, a plump overall shape and very strong emphasis on the head. The rest of the body is often depicted only in a schematic and reduced fashion; often only the upper body is depicted at all. Much South Arabian art is characterised by minimal attention to realistic proportion, which manifests with large ears and a long, narrow nose. In most cases, sculpture in the round and reliefs faced directly at the viewer; in reliefs the frontal perspective typical of ancient Egyptian art, in which the head and legs are depicted from the side, but the torso from the front, is occasionally encountered. Pupils were made of coloured material which was inserted into holes in the eyes. Initially, drapery was not depicted, but later it was indicated by deep grooves or layers. There are no general characteristics in the arrangement of arms and legs.
  There are very few examples of large ancient South Arabian sculptures, so the inscription on an over-life-size bronze statue of the son of the Sabaean king Dhamar'ali Yuhabirr is of particular interest. It reveals that the statue was made by a Greek artist and his Arabian assistant. Much more common are small alabaster statues, portraits and reliefs, which generally depict people and more rarely animals or monsters (dragons and winged lions with human heads), and whole scenes in the case of flat reliefs. A particularly popular scene shows a vine bearing grapes with animals or birds nibbling at it and a man who aims a bow at an animal (or variations thereon). Scenes from life are also depicted in reliefs, such as feasts, battles, and musical performances, as well as scenes of the dead meeting with a deity.
caption: Funerary stele, in the upper band: banquet scene with three people, in the lower band: camel driver with two camels; 1st-3rd centuries AD; alabaster; height: 55 cm (21​1⁄2 in.); Louvre-Lens (Lens, France)
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