page_title: Luristan bronze
section_title: Horse cheekpieces
hierarchical_section_title: Luristan bronze / Types of objects / Horse cheekpieces
caption_attribution_description: Tools and Equipment; horse trappings Bronze Length: 4 in. (10.16 cm) Gift of Carl Holmes (64.12.40) Art of the Ancient Near East
context_page_description: Luristan bronzes are small cast objects decorated with bronze sculptures from the Early Iron Age which have been found in large numbers in Lorestān Province and Kermanshah in western Iran. They include a great number of ornaments, tools, weapons, horse-fittings and a smaller number of vessels including situlae, and those found in recorded excavations are generally found in burials. The ethnicity of the people who created them remains unclear, though they may well have been Persian, possibly related to the modern Lur people who have given their name to the area. They probably date to between about 1000 and 650 BC.
  The bronzes tend to be flat and use openwork, like the related metalwork of Scythian art. They represent the art of a nomadic or transhumant people, for whom all possessions needed to be light and portable, and necessary objects such as weapons, finials, horse-harness fittings, pins, cups and small fittings are highly decorated over their small surface area. Representations of animals are common, especially goats or sheep with large horns, and the forms and styles are distinctive and inventive.
context_section_description: Another common class of bronzes is pairs of horse cheekpieces from bits; when complete these come with a bar between them that goes in the horse's mouth. There are often rings in the upper or rear parts of the plates, for securing straps to tie round the horse's head.  These are flat openwork plates, with a reinforced central hole for the bit mouthpiece to go through; where complete sets survive these are held in place by the ends of the mouthpiece bar being curled back.
  Designs are varied, but most common are animals, very often in fantastic versions with wings, and the Master of Animals. Other subjects include charioteers, and a subject with two figures flanking a tree-like object.  Many examples survive as single plates, perhaps separated after they were dug up.  The common story that the pieces were often found placed underneath the heads of men in burials seems not to be true.  Most pieces were found in unrecorded contexts, but one example of a Luristan horse burial is known; it is unclear if it was from the same period.
  Though horse riding was very common among Near Eastern elites by this date, who all used some type of bit, this large style of cheekpiece is only found in Luristan. The rigid single-piece mouthpiece bar, secured by bent back ends, is also unusual; elsewhere more flexible mouthpieces are found.  Many pieces have small spikes on the reverse of the plates; it is thought these were either used to control the horse, or to fix backing pads of softer material.
caption: Some horse cheekpieces have the animal "body" reduced to a rectangle.
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