ticketsMember | Make a donation

Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)

late 4th–early 3rd century BCE
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 159
Translucent pale yellowish green with darker blue green streaks, with handles in same color; trails in opaque yellow and opaque turquoise blue.
Horizontal rim-disk; tall cylindrical, slanting neck; small sloping shoulder; straight-sided cylindrical body, with slight upward taper; convex bottom but with off-center pointed tip; on body, two lug handles, applied over trail pattern; one with a tooled upward horizontal indent, the other with a sideways vertical indent.
On body yellow and turquoise blue trails tooled in six alternating bands into a widely spaced feather pattern with five vertical panels of upward and downward strokes, ending around edge of bottom.
Weathered and encrusted chip in rim; broken and repaired around lower body with one large hole; dulling, slight pitting, and iridescence, with one patch of brownish encrustation on rim-disk and neck.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
  • Period: Early Hellenistic
  • Date: late 4th–early 3rd century BCE
  • Culture: Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
  • Medium: Glass; core-formed, Group II
  • Dimensions: H.: 4 7/8 in. (12.4 cm)
  • Classification: Glass
  • Credit Line: Edward C. Moore Collection, Bequest of Edward C. Moore, 1891
  • Object Number: 91.1.1372
  • Curatorial Department: Greek and Roman Art

More Artwork

More Artwork
A slider containing 5 items.
Press the down key to skip to the last item.
Terracotta alabastron (perfume vase) in the form of a woman holding a dove, Terracotta, East Greek
Terracotta alabastron (perfume vase) in the form of a woman holding a dove
East Greek
mid-6th century BCE
Glass oinochoe, Glass, Greek
Glass oinochoe
Greek
mid-4th–early 3rd century BCE
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle), Glass, Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
2nd–mid-1st century BCE
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle), Glass, Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
5th century BCE
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle), Glass, Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
late 4th–early 3rd century BCE

Research Resources

The Met provides unparalleled resources for research and welcomes an international community of students and scholars. The Met's Open Access API is where creators and researchers can connect to the The Met collection. Open Access data and public domain images are available for unrestricted commercial and noncommercial use without permission or fee.

To request images under copyright and other restrictions, please use this Image Request form.

Feedback

We continue to research and examine historical and cultural context for objects in The Met collection. If you have comments or questions about this object record, please complete and submit this form. The Museum looks forward to receiving your comments.