This dragon slayer is an Aramaic interpretation of a Phoenician motif under a triangular palette pediment, which is surrounded by a vegetal frieze. Phoenician art often depicted the theme on precious metal cups, seals and ivory furniture plates.
This Aramaic interpretation lacks the realism and dynamism of the Phoenician representations. The plump shapes were clumsily compressed into the picture frame.
The double imperial crown on the hero's head seems rather a pastiche of Egyptian art, to paraphrase an expression used by the art historian Henri Frankfort in his study of such crowns on ivories from Arslan Tash.E.G.