Small Aion from unkown provenence

TNMM 433

Leontocephaline (lion-headed) figure of unknown provenance, weighing 5.8 kg and 37 cm in height with a width of 14 cm. Its base is partially broken, so it is unclear if the figure was standing on a globe, an expected position, or not. The main figure is a standing, naked leontocephaline figure with only a loin cloth in the front and two closed wings on the back; from the front, the wings appear as a mantle around the figure, but they are clearly wings, probably belonging to an eagle.

A serpent, bound around the figure’s ankles and continuing up to his chest in five folds and through his back, finally rests its head on top of the lion’s head. The leontocephaline figure holds a cylindrical object in his right hand, which is raised above the shoulder and folded over it to rest the end of the object on the right shoulder, and is also artistically connected to the head to support the weight of the arm and the cylindrical object. The left hand of the figure rests on what appears to be the handle of a sword on the left side of the figure, although the actual scabbard is not visible, disappearing into the folds of the serpent. At the back, below where the wings of the monster meet, there is a hole which suggests it was hooked to a wall or a shelf from the back. Otherwise, the statue is in very good condition and a new addition to the iconographic typology of the beast, which is known from the Mithraic religious current in the Roman and the Mediterranean world and perhaps the Caucasus.