Lady of Baza

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The impassive seated female figure of polychromed limestone is richly dressed and adorned with ear ornaments.
The impassive seated female figure of polychromed limestone is richly dressed and adorned with ear ornaments.

The Lady of Baza (la Dama de Baza) is a famous example of Iberian art, a female figure of limestone with traces of painted detail in a stuccoed surface, that was found on July 22, 1971 by Francisco José Presedo Velo, at Baza, in the altiplano, the high tableland in the northwest of the province of Granada. Baza is the site of the Ibero-Roman city of Basti and, in the Cerro del Santuario, one of its two necropoleis, the Lady of Baza was recovered. She is seated in an armchair, and a space open on the side is thought to have contained the ashes of a cremation.[1]

The sculpture has been given a journalistic name that links it in the popular imagination to its more famous cousin, the Lady of Elx. After conservation in Madrid, the sculpture, dated to the fourth century BCE, joined the enigmatic Lady of Elx deposited in the National Archaeological Museum of Spain in Madrid. The chimera Bicha de Balazote and the standing Dama del Cerro de los Santos are exhibited in the same museum room.

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  1. ^ The sculpture was published by F. Presedo, "La necrópolis de Baza" (Madrid) 1982 pp 317-19 and plate, and by A. García y Bellido, Arte Ibérico en España (Madrid 1980) pp 52-56.

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