Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)

Unknown

mid-4th–early 3rd century BCE · Glass · Greek and Roman Art

Translucent blue, with handles in same color; trails in opaque yellow and opaque turquoise blue. Flat rim-disk, slanting slightly to one side; short cylindrical neck; small sloping shoulder; straight-sided cylindrical body, with upward taper; uneven convex bottom; on body at different heights, two lug handles, applied over trail pattern; one with trailing tail upwards across body. A yellow trail applied as a blob at top of body and another trail in turquoise added below, and both trailed down in a spiral and tooled into a close-set zigzag pattern with shallow vertical ribbing, ending in a spiral around edge of bottom. Complete, but cracked around middle of body; dulling, some pitting, and iridescent brownish weathering.

Artist

Unknown

Date

mid-4th–early 3rd century BCE

Medium

Glass

Culture

Greek, Eastern Mediterranean or Italian

Department

Greek and Roman Art

Credit line

Gift of Henry G. Marquand, 1881