Bronze Head of King Sargon of Akkad, 2306 B.C

"The head of Sargon plainly has been mutilated. In addition to the severing of the head from its lost body, the image bears various marks of violence—the left eye socket has been gouged out, the nose has been flattened at the tip, the ears have been cut off, and the ends of the beard have been broken. Although it has been suggested that the eye socket was damaged by someone attempting to remove an inset of precious material, there is no evidence that the hole ever contained anything at all and, in any case, the other damage still demands explanation. The desecration of the royal portrait was almost certainly intentional and most likely an act of political iconoclasm, possibly carried out at the time of Nineveh’s fall to the Medes and Babylonians in the early seventh century BCE. The selective disfiguration of the head suggests that the goal was not to wipe away all presence of the royal figure, but rather to leave it in a state of defeat and humiliation."