CIRCA 1ST CENTURY A.D.

For a similar example, perhaps from the same workshop, excavated at Begram, see no. 175 in Hiebert and Cambon, eds., Afghanistan, Hidden Treasures from the National Museum, Kabul. Many of the objects from Begram were not locally made. Some were imported into Bactria from the Greco-Roman world to the west, especially from Chersonesus (Black Sea) and Alexandria, Egypt, but also from India to the east. The material and style of this rare alabaster patera suggests Alexandria as the source, perhaps as early as the late Hellenistic period.