Condition
Mended. Exterior covered with whitish iridescent weathering; interior covered with weathering and soil crust.
Description
Flaring, flattened rim; cylindrical neck, tapering toward the bulbous body; flat bottom. The vessel consists of apporximately 18 amber-colored and white rods, which were fused together, slumped, and blown to form the closed shape of the vessel and then “combed” 11 times, forming a distinct zigzag pattern. Rotary marks are visible in the interior of the neck.
Comments and Comparanda
For the production technique, see comments on cat. 148.
This type of squat flask is well-known and has been unearthed in different parts of the Roman Empire, mainly in the western areas and Italy, which is considered to be their production site (Isings, Clasina. 1957. Roman Glass from Dated Finds. Groningen: Wolters., pp. 22–23, form 6; Grose, David Frederick. 1989. Early Ancient Glass: Core-Formed, Rod-Formed, and Cast Vessels and Objects from the Late Bronze Age to the Early Roman Empire, 1600 B.C. to A.D. 50. New York: Hudson Hills Press., pp. 261–262, 339–340, no. 609). The decoration of these glass vessels imitated vessels carved from semiprecious stone, especially sardonyx. Published examples include finds from Aquileia (Calvi, M. C. 1968. I vetri romani del Museo di Aquileia. Aquileia: Associazione Nazionale per Aquileia., plate 5, nos. 1–3), Athens (Alexandri, Olga. 1972. “Αθήνα, οδός Κερατσινίου 54 και Πλάτωνος (Οικόπεδο Ζορμπά).” Archaiologikon Deltion 27 (Chronika B1): 115–118., pp. 115–118, plate 76), Zadar (Ravagnan, Giovanna Luisa. 1994. Vetri antichi del Museo Vetrario di Murano. Collezioni dello Stato. Corpus delle collezioni archeologiche del vetro nel Veneto 1. Venice: Comitato Nazionale Italiano, AIHV., p. 67, no. 105), and Bahrain (Nenna, Marie-Dominique. 1999. “La vererrie.” In Bahreïn: La civilisation entre deux mers—De Dilmoun à Tylos. Exposition présentée à l’Institut du monde arabe du 18 mai au 29 août 1999, 181–191. Paris: Institut du Monde Arabe., p. 188, no. 280). In addition, several examples are in museum collections: the Louvre (Arveiller-Dulong, Véronique, and Marie-Dominique Nenna. 2005. Les verres antiques du Musée du Louvre 2: Vaisselle et contenants du Ier siècle au début du VIIe siècle après J.-C. Paris: Somogy., pp. 74–75, nos. 91, 94–95, 97, probably from Italy); National Museum of Scotland (Lightfoot, Christopher S. 2007. Ancient Glass in National Museums Scotland. Edinburgh: National Museums Scotland., p. 48, nos. 46–47); Fitzwilliam Museum (Glass at the Fitzwilliam Museum. 1978. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press., p. 25, no. 38); Miho Museum (Ancient Glass / Kodai garasu. 2001. Shigaraki: Miho Museum., pp. 95, 203, no. 127); and previously in the Winfield Smith Collection (Glass from the Ancient World: The Ray Winfield Smith Collection. 1957. Corning, NY: Corning Museum of Glass in the Corning Glass Center., p. 89, no. 149). The same shape has been rendered in gold-band mosaic glass as well (see Oliver, Andrew, Jr. 1967. “Late Hellenistic Glass in the Metropolitan Museum.” Journal of Glass Studies 9: 13–33., p. 23, no. 3, fig. 17; Kunina, Nina. 1997. The Art Treasures of Russia: Ancient Glass in the Hermitage Collection. St. Petersburg: State Hermitage/ARS Publishers., p. 268, no. 95), and in a mosaic pattern that may be an example of blown mosaic vessels (Glass from the Ancient World: The Ray Winfield Smith Collection. 1957. Corning, NY: Corning Museum of Glass in the Corning Glass Center., p. 85, no. 141).
Provenance
By 1974–1988, Erwin Oppenländer, 1901–1988 (Waiblingen, Germany), by inheritance to his son, Gert Oppenländer, 1988; 1988–2003, Gert Oppenländer (Waiblingen, Germany), sold to the J. Paul Getty Museum, 2003
Bibliography
Saldern von, Axel, Birgit Nolte, Peter La Baume, and Thea Elisabeth Haevernick. 1974. Gläser der Antike. Sammlung Erwin Oppenländer. Mainz: von Zabern., p. 130, no. 354.
Exhibitions
Molten Color: Glassmaking in Antiquity (Malibu, 2005–2006; 2007; 2009–2010)
Gläser der Antike: Sammlung Erwin Oppenländer (Hamburg and Cologne, 1974–1975)