• m10-cor-3-10
    Overview of sherd with wavy lines. (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)
  • m10-cor-3-20
    Drawing: profile. (©Archaeological Exploration of Sardis/President and Fellows of Harvard College)

Corinthian Geometric Linear Kotyle Fragment

Date
Ca. 750-690 BC, Lydian
Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
P81.002
Material
Ceramic
Object Type
Pottery
Pottery Shape
Kotyle
Pottery Ware
Corinthian Geometric
Pottery Attribution
Site
Sardis
Sector
F49
Trench
F49 81.1
B-Grid Coordinates
E845.6 - E848.5 / S299.6 - S302 *188.7 - 187
Findspot
N Wall
Description

Late in LG or early in EPC. A fragment from the handle frieze. Exterior: a line of glaze appears near the rim. Below, in the frieze, a single heron faces to right beside three parallel zigzag lines. The heron's beak curves up and out to touch the uppermost of the lines. Originally there must have been at least one other bird confronting this heron across the zigzags. The heron has a reserved eye, a silhouette body forming a large S curve, a long tail that does not quite touch the ground, and two long straight legs. He lacks the double crest and branched feet typical of earlier LG herons. The right leg is thicker than the left, but the ends of both legs stand firmly on the topmost of the parallel lines that decorate the body of the kotyle. Three of these lines, varying in thickness, remain. Interior glazed, with no reserved line near the lip. Glaze: exterior, reddish brown to dark brown; interior, brown with reddish brown streaks. Clay: smooth and hard, with some air pockets. Munsell no. 10 YR 7/4 (very pale brown).

This is the only certain example of a heron yet found at Sardis, although Cor 2 belongs to the heron type of LG. Cor 3 falls between Coldstream's LG and EPC types, the heron having lost the hatched body, claw foot, and long double crest of LG, but still retaining a profile eye, two legs, a fairly long tail, and a position next to a series of horizontal zigzag lines. Cor 3 should date to the transition from LG to EPC (supra, "Kotylai with Linear Decoration," 10-11).

Late in LG or early in EPC. A fragment from the handle frieze. Exterior: a line of glaze appears near the rim. Below, in the frieze, a single heron faces to right beside three parallel zigzag lines. The heron's beak curves up and out to touch the uppermost of the lines. Originally there must have been at least one other bird confronting this heron across the zigzags. The heron has a reserved eye, a silhouette body forming a large S curve, a long tail that does not quite touch the ground, and two long straight legs. He lacks the double crest and branched feet typical of earlier LG herons. The right leg is thicker than the left, but the ends of both legs stand firmly on the topmost of the parallel lines that decorate the body of the kotyle. Three of these lines, varying in thickness, remain. Interior glazed, with no reserved line near the lip. Glaze: exterior, reddish brown to dark brown; interior, brown with reddish brown streaks. Clay: smooth and hard, with some air pockets. Munsell no. 10 YR 7/4 (very pale brown).

This is the only certain example of a heron yet found at Sardis, although Cor 2 belongs to the heron type of LG. Cor 3 falls between Coldstream's LG and EPC types, the heron having lost the hatched body, claw foot, and long double crest of LG, but still retaining a profile eye, two legs, a fairly long tail, and a position next to a series of horizontal zigzag lines. Cor 3 should date to the transition from LG to EPC (supra, "Kotylai with Linear Decoration," 10-11).

Dimensions
P.H. 0.035; P.W. 0.058; Th. 0.003
Comments
Cf. for the development from LG to EPC, Coldstream, GGP 101--102 (LG), 105--106 (EPC); for a similar heron with two straight legs, but without the reserved eye, Corinth XV:3, no. 194, pl. 10, a bird on the neck of an oinochoe (KP 2141) assigned to the P. Q. Bird Workshop and dated EPC. See also Ithaca V 12, no. 22, pls. 2 and 3:c, birds with double crests, S-curved bodies, and two legs, facing one another across zigzags. For an example that is clearly LG, see R. M. Cook, GPP 24--25, 237, pl. 8:b, a Corinthian kotyle in Athens (NM 14476) showing herons with double crests and pronged feet confronted across zigzags (also published by Coldstream, GGP 101, pl. 19:k).
See Also
Bibliography
Author
JS