Property from a Distinguished Estate, New York
A Greek Marble Grave Stele, Attic, circa 2nd Century B.C.
Estimate
80,000 - 120,000 GBP
Lot Details
Description
carved in high relief with the nude figure of a boy standing with the weight on his right leg and holding a bird in his right hand, his long wavy bound in a fillet, a Melitaean dog leaping toward the bird at his feet, the stele crowned by a gabled pediment with acroteria.
127 by 51 cm.
Pepys Cockerell, Esq., London
Brummer Gallery, Paris and New York, inv. no. P2595, acquired from the above in 1926
Ella Baché Brummer (Galerie Koller and Spink & Son, Zurich, The Ernst Brummer Collection, Part II, October 16th-19th, 1979, no. 618, illus.)
The Merrin Gallery, New York
acquired by the present owner from the above, June 4th 1981
Brummer Gallery inventory card and photographs: https://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16028coll9/id/62440/rec/1
Parke-Bernet Galleries, Part III of the Art Collection Belonging to the Estate of the late Joseph Brummer, June 8th-9th, 1949, no. 483
For a recent discussion of the game of bird and dog played by children on Attic stelai from the 4th century B.C. onwards see K. Margariti, Dogs in Athenian Sculpture and Vase Painting of the Archaic and Classical Periods, 2025, p. 147ff. For a late Classical parallel see Sotheby's, New York, June 7th, 2012, no. 11.
The Brummer Gallery inventory card states: "For full description and history see annex to letter dated Feb. 18, 1926." This document does not appear to be preserved in the Brummer Records, but its mention suggests that the provenance of the present lot extends further back by descent, possibly to the architect, archaeologist, and collector Charles Robert Cockerell (1788-1863, son of Samuel Pepys Cockerell), whose work was instrumental in the early recording and understanding of Athenian and other Mediterranean antiquities. Several objects "brought back from Greece" by Ch. R. Cockerell appear in the catalogue of the Burlington's Fine Art Club's Exhibition of Ancient Greek Art, London, 1904, on loan by a "Mrs. Frederick Pepys Cockerell." The "Pepys Cockerell, esq." mentioned as the seller on the Brummer card was probably Ch. R. Cockerell's grandson, Lt.-Col. Frederick William Pepys Cockerell (1876-1932).
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