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Lot Essay
Egyptian vessels constructed from rock crystal are exceptionally rare. For a similar example, see the alabastron inscribed for Pharaoh User-maat-re Rudamun of the 23rd Dynasty in the Louvre, pp. 104-105 in I. Bardiès-Fronty and S. Pennec, eds., Voyage dans le cristal. The present example was likely altered in antiquity; originally, it had small lug handles high on the shoulders and a larger rim.
The famous “Sargon Vase” from Assur, now in the British Museum, reflects the new technological capacity in the 8th century B.C. to cast vessels of this shape in transparent glass, imitating calcite and rock crystal prototypes (see A. Caubet, “Phoenician and East Mediterranean Glass,” in J. Aruz, et al., eds., Assyria to Iberia at the Dawn of the Classical Age, pp. 167-170). Such alabastra had an extraordinarily wide distribution from Egypt to Assyria, and it is possible that this example was modified to reflect local tastes outside of Egypt, its likely place of production. Similar alabastra were repurposed as far away as Spain for funerary use (see. J.L.L. Castro, “Colonials, Merchants, and Alabaster Vases: The Western Phoenician Aristocracy,” Antiquity, vol. 80, no. 307, pp. 74-88).
The famous “Sargon Vase” from Assur, now in the British Museum, reflects the new technological capacity in the 8th century B.C. to cast vessels of this shape in transparent glass, imitating calcite and rock crystal prototypes (see A. Caubet, “Phoenician and East Mediterranean Glass,” in J. Aruz, et al., eds., Assyria to Iberia at the Dawn of the Classical Age, pp. 167-170). Such alabastra had an extraordinarily wide distribution from Egypt to Assyria, and it is possible that this example was modified to reflect local tastes outside of Egypt, its likely place of production. Similar alabastra were repurposed as far away as Spain for funerary use (see. J.L.L. Castro, “Colonials, Merchants, and Alabaster Vases: The Western Phoenician Aristocracy,” Antiquity, vol. 80, no. 307, pp. 74-88).