alabastron
- Museum number
- 1864,1007.1220
- Description
-
Core-formed glass alabastron.
Opaque orange and opaque light blue trails, translucent cobalt blue body and one handle, the other handle opaque orange.
Broad horizontal rim-disc, tool-marks on upper and under surfaces; short, cylindrical neck; round-angled shoulder; elongated oval body with maximum diameter below the middle; rounded bottom. Below shoulder, two vertical ring-handles with knobbed tails.
Unmarvered orange trail round edge of lip; another, marvered, beginning at top of handles and wound spirally round vessel, at first in straight lines, then in zigzags at middle of body, where a light blue trail begins, mingling with it. Overlapping lowest part of zigzag are two horizontal orange trails flanking a light blue trail, all unmarvered.
Core-formed; rim-disc and handles trailed on and tooled, the handles formed by drawing upward from a drop-on at bottom and folding inward over a tool to make the ring.
- Production date
- 475BC-450BC
- Dimensions
-
Diameter: 3.60 centimetres (body)
-
Diameter: 3.10 centimetres (rim)
-
Height: 11.70 centimetres
- Curator's comments
- Attributed to Fikellura grave 28, based on evidence from Biliotti's Kamiros diary, Kamiros tomb list, British Museum register, departmental Kamiros index card. Description in Biliotti's Kamiros diary: Glass phiale with yellow bands round the body (1 entire). No marking of grave number visible on the object itself.
Attributions to find-spots are based on (1) Alfred Biliotti’s diary kept during excavations at Kamiros between November 1863 and June 1864, which records the contents of two votive deposits and over 300 graves; (2) entries in the Museum Register, often stipulating the find-spots of individual objects excavated by Biliotti; (3) the Kamiros tomb list, produced around the same time as his entries in the Museum Register. It lists the contents of each grave and votive deposit, along with their corresponding registration numbers; (4) the Kamiros index cards, written by Donald Bailey in the 1960’s. These mainly record the contents of graves from the Fikellura cemetery and are organised according to tomb group. All archives are kept in the Department of Greece and Rome. In addition, Reynold Higgins’ Catalogue of the Terracottas in the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities (1954) has been checked for attributions to the Fikellura cemetery.
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
- Broken and mended, upper part of blue handle and end-knob of orange handle missing. Some lime-encrustation. Surface dulled with some iridescence.
- Acquisition date
- 1864
- Department
- Greek and Roman
- Registration number
- 1864,1007.1220
- Additional IDs
-
Miscellaneous number: DBH.0079 (Harden number)
