Souvenir de vacances : fake or not fake, that 's the question...

[antwerpen2306]

FI am terminating now the second part of the work on my antiquities : Greek and Roman. On my second trip with my car  to Turkey in October 1973, I was lucky to get 2 small statues near Kayseri, the ancient Caesarea. The exchange was made in the middle of ruins with two young boys. In that tine, I was thinking the 2 were fake, but now I have some doubts.

First the lion :  189 mm x 57 mm x 93 mm, limestone

ant the head : 109 mm x 103 mm x 87 mm, basalt ?

By taking photo's now, I remarked dried sand in the mouth of the lion and in the hear of the statue what gives me doubts on my first idea. Maybe there were real ? Then I made this reasoning : Turkey was not at all a touristic place in the beginning seventies, not at the coast and still less in the middle of the country. I was exchanging with two young boys, 15/16 years and I was maybe the first stranger they saw there visiting the ruins : entrance free, free entrance, no guards as on many places in that time. The production of this objects takes a good ability and machines to produce, so there is a certain cost. I was there with my car and I knew from my first trip in 1969 it was possible to get old artifacts by exchanging, so I had a lot of ancient blankets with me. I had the two statues for four blankets...

There are no sign of modern tools as far as I can see, but signs of cleaning on the forehead. So, fake or not ?

Next problem : dating the statues. For the lion I am thinking   second or first century BC, for the head late Roman third century. 

What is your opinion ? Have you a similar experience ?

 

 

 

Thinking this way, it is

 

[AETHER]

This sounds like a start to an Indiana Jones movie.. wish I had some input for you. Haha.

[antwerpen2306]

@thanks but I am sure you have also some histories to tell collecting