Spouted jar and stand

This biconical pitcher has a squat round body with a flat base. A pointed spout with an angled protrusion below it emerges from one side of the body. The spout is attached to the rim by a small bridge. It sits on a hollow cylindrical stand with a ring base and a collar at the top. The sides of the cylinder are open in horizontal strips. Both the pitcher and the stand are made of burnished grey clay. Both were made on a potter’s wheel. The pitcher was probably made in two halves that were joined together, with the spout added later.

This pitcher and its stand were excavated from a grave at Hasanlu, a large settlement site in northwestern Iran. During the Iron Age Hasanlu was one of the largest and most powerful towns in Iran, and probably controlled much of the Ushnu-Solduz valley until its destruction ca. 800 B.C. by the Urartians. Like many in western Iran in this period, the people of Hasanlu made ceramic pitchers like this one with globular bodies and long spouts.

It is not clear what this pitcher was used for. Presumably it was used to pour a liquid containing dregs, such as wine, since the round body and spout would prevent the dregs from ending up in the cup. Some of the earliest evidence for winemaking in Iran, dating back to the sixth millennium B.C., comes from the nearby site of Hajji Firuz Tepe. Also, similar pitchers of contemporary date have been found in graves at Dinkha Tepe, some fifteen miles west of Hasanlu, along with cups, further suggesting that they parts of drinking sets. The purpose of the stand is unclear; perhaps funerary protocols at Hasanlu required that these pitchers be displayed prominently.