Stone vase, known as a kandila
Early Bronze Age, about 3200-2800 BC
From the Cyclades, Aegean Sea
Like the local sanctuary lamps
The Early Bronze Age inhabitants of the Cyclades used their
local supplies of fine white marble to make both figurines and a
variety of stone vases. This particular shape, with its
sea-urchin-shaped body and conical neck and foot, was common in the
first (Grotta-Pelos) phase of their culture, between about 3200 and
2800 BC. Hundreds of examples survive, and are called
kandila (lamps) by the modern islanders, because of a
supposed resemblance to the sanctuary lamps in Greek churches.
The original use of the kandila is not known, but they
must have been labour-intensive to produce. It is remarkable to
consider that they were made at a time when metals were hardly
available in the islands, and tools were made of such materials as
stone, wood or bone. Kandiles were more likely to have had
a special, perhaps ritual, purpose, rather than an everyday
function.
They range in size from about seven to about thirty-seven
centimetres in height. They are often very heavy, as they were not
fully hollowed and the internal space is relatively small.
J.L. Fitton, Cycladic art, 2nd ed. (London, The British Museum Press, 1999)
P. Getz-Gentle, Stone vessels of the Cyclades (Pennsylvania, 1996)