Bottle

Bottle

A different type of cut-glass object is represented by a rather sizable number of globular bottles with a slighly tapering neck that ends in a large splayed mouth, and standing on a tapering foot. These bottles, blown in one piece—possibly in a mold—and produced with thick walls, are rather solid and they might have been used as containers for semi-precious liquids in order to be transported and traded. The main decoration on the body consists of horizontal rows of hexagons (this type of decoration is usually called "honeycomb pattern") obtained by slicing off portions of the surface from the original spherical shape. The patterns on the neck and the foot of the vessel are achieved with the same technique, and the mouth itself is obtained by grinding down the glass until the appropriate shape is obtained.

The so-called honeycomb pattern was not new to the Iranian glass-makers of the 10th–11th centuries because it was well-known in the same area and in Mesopotamia already in the Sasanian period (3rd–7th century A.D.) when objects in glass and metal, especially hemispheric bowls, were produced and displayed the very same decorative pattern. The Iranian glass-cutters of the early Islamic period revived this particular motif but they applied it to different types of vessels that cannot be mistaken for Sasanian pieces. The surface of this bottle, which was buried for a long period of time, has been attacked by chemical elements present in the soil and is entirely covered by a somewhat appealing iridescence.

Stefano Carboni in [Walker et al. 1994]

[ Nasli M. Heeramaneck, New York, until 1963; sold to MMA]

The Hagop Kevorkian Special Exhibitions Gallery, New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Glass Gathers," May 24, 1990–March 31, 1991, no catalogue.

Mexico City. Colegio de San Ildefonso. "Arte Islámico del Museo Metropolitano de Arte de Nueva York," September 30, 1994–January 8, 1995, no. 65.

Swietochowski, Marie. "Medieval Islamic Glass." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin vol. 23 (February 1965). p. 202, ill. fig. 7 (b/w).

Clairmont, Christoph. "Some Islamic Glass in the Metropolitan Museum." Islamic Art in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (1972). p. 149, ill. fig. 13 (b/w).

Jenkins-Madina, Marilyn. "Islamic Glass: A Brief History." MMA Bulletin vol. 44, no. 2 (Fall 1986). p. 30, ill. (color).

The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Daniel S. Walker, Arturo Ponce Guadián, Sussan Babaie, Stefano Carboni, Aimee Froom, Marie Lukens Swietochowski, Tomoko Masuya, Annie Christine Daskalakis-Matthews, Abdallah Kahli, and Rochelle Kessler. "Colegio de San Ildefonso, Septiembre de 1994–Enero de 1995." In Arte Islámico del Museo Metropolitano de Arte de Nueva York. Mexico City: Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, 1994. no. 65, pp. 174–75, ill. (color).