Halaf potters far surpassed their predecessors and successors in the embellishment and delicacy of their designs and the fine quality of the pottery itself. The background is often, as here, a buff color with red and black decoration produced on the vessel from the same iron oxide pigment, technically a very advanced achievement. This fragment of a vessel with slightly flaring rim has the exterior painted with parts of two black-outlined metopes, one with a red rosette, the other with a red design outlined in black, on light buff ground. A red band decorates the interior rim.
1976-1988, excavated by David and Joan Oates, on behalf of the Institute of Archaeology, University of London; acquired by the Museum in 1988, as a result of its financial contribution to the excavations.
Annual Report of the Trustees of the Metropolitan Museum of Art 119 (Jul. 1,1988 - Jun. 30, 1989), p. 16.