Condition
Mended; part of the mouth is restored.
Description
Folded in, flaring rim; cylindrical neck, constricted at its base; pear-shaped body; flat bottom. The vessel was made with florets and then free-blown. The florets used for its production are mainly of green glass with tiny yellow stems inside and a few of concentric circles with a wide red layer in a thinner white.
Comments and Comparanda
Blown mosaic vessels represent a relatively unknown and apparently quite rare category of Roman glass. They were produced with a particular technique that involved blowing sections of composite mosaic canes that had been heated up and fused together. It was used to form vessels in shapes that were contemporaneously made with free-blowing too, like cups, small jars, and possibly jugs and/or modioli. These are much thinner vessels than the slumped/sagged and blown ones; the patterns are heavily distorted, unrecognizable in most cases, especially in the interior of the vessel.
Blown mosaic glass was probably produced from the late first century CE to the second half of the second century CE. Several examples have been unearthed in Augusta Raurica in Switzerland, which may have been the production site of this technique. Other examples have been found elsewhere in western Europe, including the UK, France, and Germany, but also on the Black Sea coast and in the Balkans (Stern, Eva Marianne. 2017. “Blown Mosaic Glass of the Roman Period: Technical Observations and Experiments.” In Annales du 20e Congrès de l’Association Internationale pour l’Histoire du Verre, Friboug-Romont, 7–11 septembre 2015, ed. Sofie Wolf and Ann de Pury-Gysel, 132–139. Rahden: Marie Leidorf., pp. 132–139; Stern, Eva Marianne, and Sylvia Fünfschilling. 2020. “Blown Mosaic Glass from Augusta Raurica (Switzerland).” Journal of Glass Studies 62: 41–68., pp. 41–68).
The form of this vessel is a very widely distributed type of first-century CE ointment flask or unguentarium (Isings, Clasina. 1957. Roman Glass from Dated Finds. Groningen: Wolters., pp. 22–23, form 6 variant; De Tommaso, Giandomenico. 1990. Ampullae vitreae: Contenitori in vetro di unguenti e sostanze aromatiche dell’Italia romana (I sec. a.C.–III sec. d.C.). Roma: Bretschneider., p. 63, type 38; Fünfschilling, Sylvia. 2015. Die römischen Gläser aus Augst und Kaiseraugst. Kommentierter Formenkatalog und ausgewählte Neufunde 1981–2010 aus Augusta Raurica. Forschungen in Augst 51. Augst: Augusta Raurica., p. 402, form AR 127 = Rütti, Beat. 1991. Die römischen Gläser aus Augst und Kaiseraugst. Augst: Römermuseum., p. 114, plate 100, form AR 127/I) present in the central European and Mediterranean provinces of the Roman Empire.
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. 123, no. 329; p. 117, plate no. 329.
Exhibitions
Molten Color: Glassmaking in Antiquity (Malibu, 2005–2006; 2007; 2009–2010)
Gläser der Antike: Sammlung Erwin Oppenländer (Hamburg and Cologne, 1974–1975)