Roman, Imperial Period, ca. 1st to 3rd century CE. A stunning aqua blue glass vessel with a near-spherical body, a cylindrical neck leading to a funnel mouth, and elegant trailed handles of teal hues joining rim to shoulder. A broken pontil graces the concave base. Adding to the decorative aspect of the bulbous body are a sweet trio of teal glass droplets equidistantly spaced around the lower third of the body, as well as traces of rainbow and silvery iridescence. Size: 3.75" W at widest point x 3.625" H (9.5 cm x 9.2 cm)

The following quote waxes poetic about the process of free-blown glass in ancient Rome, "First he heated the very point of the iron, then snatched from nearby a lump of bright glass and placed it skillfully within the hollow furnace. And the crystal as it tasted the heat of the fire was softened by the strokes of Hephaestus like . . .he blue in from his mouth a quick breath . . . .like a man essaying the most delightful art of the flute. The glass received the force of his breath and became swollen out around itself like a sphere before it. It would receive another onslaught of the divine breath, for often swinging it like an ox-herd his crook he would breath into . . ." ( P. Oxy. 50.3536, a third century poem on glass blowing - R.A. Coles, Oxyrhynchus Papyri 50 (1983), p. 58 from "Solid Liquid" catalogue, Fortuna Fine Arts, New York, 1999, p. 56)

Provenance: private East Coast, USA collection

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#131366

Small loss to the upper tip of one trailed handle. Nice broken pontil. Areas of earthen encrustation. Attractive rainbow and silvery iridescence.