Bull's head from column capital
An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art
The monumental art and architecture of the Achaemenid period are best exemplified by the ruins of Persepolis, the large ceremonial capital of the empire originally built by Darius I (r. 521–486 B.C.) and expanded by his successors. Persepolis is located thirty miles northwest of Shiraz in the southwest Iranian province of Fars. There, structures like the "Hall of One Hundred Columns" and the "Throne Room of Darius and Xerxes" exhibit features characteristic of Achaemenid palace architecture—large square rooms, with ceilings supported by many columns. Some of the columns in the Throne Room have been reconstructed and stand more than sixty-five feet high. The column capitals were decorated with the foreparts of bulls, lions, and griffins carved in the round. This object being a prime example of a standard bull's head. The sculptures often consisted of the addorsed foreparts of such creatures to form a solid support for the wooden beams they held. This type of architectural decoration appears to be an entirely Achaemenid creation but this sculpture was reused during the early Islamic period in a building identified as a mosque at Istakhr, near Persepolis. The Medieval geographer Muqadassi mentions exactly that in the tenth century the Istakhr mosque has "columns, with cows on them."
Ancient Near Eastern Art
An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Met's Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art cares for approximately 7,000 works ranging in date from the eighth millennium B.C. through the centuries just beyond the emergence of Islam in the seventh century A.D. Objects in the collection were created by people in the area that today comprises Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Syria, the Eastern Mediterranean coast, Yemen, and Central Asia. From the art of some of the world's first cities to that of great empires, the department's holdings illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship as well as the profound interconnections, cultural and religious diversity, and lasting legacies that characterize the ancient art of this vast region.