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Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)

2nd–1st century BCE
Not on view
Translucent blue, with handles in same color; trails in opaque yellow and opaque white.
Broad rim-disk, uneven and sloping inward with radiating tooling marks on upper and lower surfaces, and jagged, projecting inner lip to neck; cylindrical neck; straight-sided fusiform body expanding downward, then tapering in to pointed bottom; two elongated horizontal lug handles applied at top of body over trails; marvered blob of blue applied over trails on one side at point of greatest diameter.
Trails attached near bottom, drawn up in a spiral to point of carination, tooled into a close-set feather pattern around side, arranged in seven panels of alternating upward and downward strokes, some slanting and extending onto neck, forming a partial festoon pattern, wound round again in spiral to top of body and on to edge of rim, with white sometimes overlapping yellow.
Intact; some bubbles; very slight dulling, pitting, and iridescent weathering.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
  • Period: Late Hellenistic
  • Date: 2nd–1st century BCE
  • Culture: Greek, Eastern Mediterranean
  • Medium: Glass; core-formed, Group III
  • Dimensions: H.: 5 1/16 in. (12.9 cm)
    Diam.: 1 7/16 x 1 1/4 in. (3.6 x 3.1 cm)
  • Classification: Glass
  • Credit Line: Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1917
  • Object Number: 17.194.599
  • Curatorial Department: Greek and Roman Art

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