Cylinder Seal with the Persian King Grasping Two Lions (main view, front)

Cylinder seals, which had been used for millennia in Mesopotamia and Iran, continued to be made in the Achaemenid Persian period (550-330 BC), but they are rare in Lydia. This example, however, is engraved in the precise style typical of the pyramidal Lydian-Achaemenid workshop. It shows the common motif of the Persian king grasping two lions, with the winged solar disk representing the Iranian god Ahura Mazda above, as well as a personal symbol of Lydian type.