Glass saucepan with snake-thread decoration
Colorless with greenish tinge; handle in same glass; trails in yellowish opaque white and translucent cobalt blue.
Rim with inner lip, folded out and down, forming narrow collar; convex curving side to body; tubular low foot ring, made by folding; uneven bottom with pontil mark and raised central boss on interior; solid rod handle applied to upper side, with pinched flat, rounded finial.
Body decorated with two white and two blue serrated snake-thread trails, each making a similar abstract curvilinear design.
Broken and repaired with one hole in upper body below rim; pinprick bubbles; dulling, faint iridescent weathering, and one patch of brown soil encrustation on side.
The colored "snake-thread" decoration is typical of glass made at Cologne, one of the major Roman cities in the Rhineland. Originally established as a legionary fortress, the site became a Roman colony in A.D. 50 and quickly developed as an important center of trade and production, supplying not only the army but also the civilian population of the neighboring provinces.
Rim with inner lip, folded out and down, forming narrow collar; convex curving side to body; tubular low foot ring, made by folding; uneven bottom with pontil mark and raised central boss on interior; solid rod handle applied to upper side, with pinched flat, rounded finial.
Body decorated with two white and two blue serrated snake-thread trails, each making a similar abstract curvilinear design.
Broken and repaired with one hole in upper body below rim; pinprick bubbles; dulling, faint iridescent weathering, and one patch of brown soil encrustation on side.
The colored "snake-thread" decoration is typical of glass made at Cologne, one of the major Roman cities in the Rhineland. Originally established as a legionary fortress, the site became a Roman colony in A.D. 50 and quickly developed as an important center of trade and production, supplying not only the army but also the civilian population of the neighboring provinces.
Artwork Details
- Title: Glass saucepan with snake-thread decoration
- Period: Mid Imperial
- Date: 3rd century CE
- Culture: Roman
- Medium: Glass; blown and trailed
- Dimensions: diameter 4 in. (10.2 cm)
length with handle 5 7/8 in. (15 cm) - Classification: Glass
- Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1959
- Object Number: 59.11.13
- Curatorial Department: Greek and Roman Art
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3rd century CE
late 1st–2nd century CE
ca. 50–80 CE
Ennion
1st half of 1st century CE
2nd century CE
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