• latw-196-1
    Core-formed glass oinochoe. (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)
  • latw-196-2
    Glass oinochoe (No. 196), aryballoi (Nos. 198-199), and alabastron (No. 197). (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)

Core-formed glass oinochoe

Date
Second half of the fifth century BC, Late Lydian (Persian)
Museum
Manisa, Archaeological and Ethnographic Museum, 9056
Museum Inventory No.
9056
Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
G03.001
Material
Glass
Object Type
Glass
Site
Sardis
Sector
Nec
Trench
Tomb 03.1
Locus
Tomb 03.1 Locus 1
B-Grid Coordinates
W540 / S995
Description
Oinochoe of core-formed and trail-decorated translucent dark-blue glass. Flat disc foot, partially missing, shows trail decoration in light blue. Ovoid body, short neck, rounded rim pinched into trefoil mouth with applied trail of light-blue glass on lip. Lower part of high-swung handle preserved. Opaque yellow trail at shoulder; opaque yellow and light blue trail at center, dragged alternately up and down. Below, three more light blue trails. Height 0.0868 m, diameter 0.0521 m.
Comments
From an undisturbed chamber tomb in the extramural cemetery of Sardis (see Baughan, “Lydian Burial Customs”). Core-forming is one of the earlier techniques of manufacturing glass vessels. In this technique, softened glass is built up or wound around a solid core; after the glass hardens, the core is broken up and removed. The zig-zag patterns were made by trailing threads of colored glass around the vessel, and then, while the glass was still soft, using a metal tool on the surface to draw the colored trails into a pattern. The vessel was then rolled along a flat surface (marvered) to smooth the surface. The shapes and decorations are quite standardized, belonging to “Mediterranean Group I.”
See Also
Baughan, “Lydian Burial Customs”.
Bibliography
Greenewalt 2005, 82-3; forthcoming study by Susanne Ebbinghaus.
Author
NDC