**First Time At Auction**

Rome, Imperial Period, ca. 1st to 3rd century CE. A mold-made pottery oil lamp with an intriguing bullfighting scene presented within the central tondo. The tondo shows 5 figures trying to wrestle a bull, with one flying into the air both in front of the animal and another behind the animal, one figure seated in front of the animal, and the remaining two figures successfully grasping the head and body of the beast. A cord-patterned border and textured shoulder surrounds the tondo, with a tab-shaped handle on the verso, and a pair of eye-shaped ornaments flanking either side of the protruding wick spout. A petite fill hole within the tondo has iron oxidation along one side, indicative of the original iron wick. Size: 4.5" L x 3.125" W x 1.8" H (11.4 cm x 7.9 cm x 4.6 cm)

Provenance: ex-Herakles Numismatics, Huntersville, North Carolina, USA; ex-Frank Kovacs collection before 2011

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#163536

Minor softening to some finer details, with area of oxidation beside fill hole in tondo, and light encrustations, otherwise intact and very good. Nice preservation of bullfighting motif within tondo.