Ribbed Bowl
Ribbed Bowl
Place of OriginCyprus, excavated by 1873
Datelate 1st century BCE-mid 1st century CE
DimensionsGlass Dimensions: 1 5/8 × 4 7/8 × 1/8 in. (4.2 × 12.4 × 0.3 cm)
Mediumglass
ClassificationGlass
Credit LinePurchased from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Object number
1916.153
Not on View
DescriptionThis ribbed bowl was formed by sagging a disk of glass over a mold. The glass is colorless with a yellowish tinge. The vessel features a slightly outsplayed rim with an uneven, rounded edge, shallow curving sides, and a nearly flat base with a slight convexity on its upper surface.
The interior is rotary-polished and includes three narrow horizontal grooves: one just below the rim, and two forming a band around the middle of the body. The exterior is fire-polished and decorated with thirty-nine shallow, close-set vertical ribs that terminate at the junction of the side and bottom. The interior was also cut, and the rim shows visible tooling marks.
Label TextThis small object marks a formative moment in the Toledo Museum of Art’s “teenage years.” In 1916, the museum made a deliberate decision to collect Greek and Roman antiquities more systematically, acquiring a group of eighty-eight ceramic, bronze, and glass objects from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. All were excavated on Cyprus by Luigi Palma di Cesnola (1832–1904), the Met’s first president, and entered Toledo’s collection when the institution was still defining the scope of its antiquities holdings.
The bronze objects (1916.134–1916.149) reflect Cyprus’s early mastery of copper, a resource so central to the island that its Latin name, cuprum, derives from Cyprus itself. Bronze Age weapons, including a dagger (1916.149), attest to early casting traditions, while later Roman-period tools reveal long-term continuity in everyday practices. Tweezers (1916.147), cosmetic implements (1916.144–145), mirrors (1916.135–136), and a rare buckle (1916.146) point to routines of personal care across centuries.
The glass vessels (1916.150–1916.165) document a different technological transformation. Most are Roman blown glass, produced after the invention of the blowpipe in the first century BCE, a development that shifted glassmaking from a luxury craft to large-scale production. One earlier ribbed bowl (1916.153), formed by slumping glass over a mold, preserves an older and more labor-intensive technique.
The acquisition also included several dozen ceramic vessels. Over time, the scope of the museum’s collection evolved, and most of these ceramics were later deaccessioned. Two Archaic vessels from Cyprus, a stamnos (1916.79) and an oinochoe (1916.96), remain in the collection as representatives of this early phase of collecting.
Published ReferencesGrose, David F., Early Ancient Glass: Core-Formed, Rod-Formed, and Cast Vessels and Objects from the Late Bronze Age to the Early Roman Empire, 1600 B.C. to A.D. 50, New York, Hudson Hills Press in association with the Toledo Museum of Art, 1989, cat. no. 233, p. 264.Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
1st century BCE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Mid-4th through early 3rd century BCE
Late 4th century BCE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Late 1st century BCE to mid-1st century CE
Late 6th through 5th century BCE
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