Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)

late 4th–early 3rd century BCE
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 158
Translucent cobalt blue, with handles in same color; trails in opaque yellow and opaque white.
Broad slightly uneven rim-disk, made as a spiral coil around top of neck; cylindrical neck, tapering downwards; angular shoulder; straight-sided cylindrical body, with slight upward taper; convex bottom; on upper body, two vertical ring handles, applied over trail pattern, one slightly higher than the other.
A yellow trail attached at edge of rim-disk; on body, alternating bands of yellow and white, tooled from top of body to undercurve at bottom into a widely spaced festoon pattern in nine vertical panels with fourteen upward strokes, forming round loops at top.
Broken and repaired, with about one third of rim-disk missing, and small holes and chips in body; many white inclusions; some trails completely weathered, leaving hollow lines in body; slight dulling, faint iridescent weathering, and some deep pitting.

Among the more striking examples of glass perfume vessels of the fourth century B.C. are tall, large-bodied alabastra in dark grounds with applied threads combed into zigzag, feather, or festoon patterns over the body.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Glass alabastron (perfume bottle)
  • Period: Hellenistic
  • Date: late 4th–early 3rd century BCE
  • Culture: Eastern Mediterranean or Italian
  • Medium: Glass; core-formed, Group II
  • Dimensions: H. 7 3/8 in. (18.7 cm)
  • Classification: Glass
  • Credit Line: Gift of Henry G. Marquand, 1881
  • Object Number: 81.10.295
  • Curatorial Department: Greek and Roman Art

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