Spherical Bottle with Dolphin Handles (Aryballos)

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Spherical Bottle with Dolphin Handles (Aryballos)

Place of OriginRoman Empire

Date1st-2nd century CE

DimensionsH: 1 9/16 in. (4.0 cm); Rim Diam: 1 in. (2.5 cm); Body Diam: 1 7/8 in. (4.8 cm)

MediumGlass; free blown and tooled.

ClassificationGlass

Credit LineGift of Edward Drummond Libbey

Object number

1923.1034

Not on View

DescriptionThis spherical bottle (Isings 1957, Form 61) is made of medium thin glass with a few small, horizontally elongated bubbles. The transparent decolored glass has a grayish yellow green tinge (5 GY 7/2) and a similarly colored thread. It was free-blown with no pontil mark and includes an added thread. The hollow rim is folded outward, upward, inward, and flattened to form a broad brim. A cylindrical neck with a curved transition leads to a horizontal shoulder and a squat bulbous body with its greatest diameter at the center. The base is flattened with a depression in the center. Two so-called dolphin handles extend from the shoulder along the neck to the rim and are folded backward to the vessel’s shoulder. Eleven revolutions of spiral thread run from the center of the base to the base of the neck.