1993.02

Cylindrical Wine-Flask

Presented by the Friends of the Classics Department Museum.

Ht 21.9cm; max. diam. 12.0cm.

Stolen from the ANU collection in December 2004.

Mould-made of fine orange-red clay, slightly rough and with small white inclusions. The surface is covered with a thick matt red slip, now very worn. There is a crude, simple lip. The handles have incised strokes on each side to simulate rope. On the shoulder on both sides is a zone of leaves in relief facing downwards. The decoration of the wall on each side is in fairly deep relief.

A: Within a vine arbour, a man penetrating a woman on a couch covered with drapery. Her right leg comes over his left shoulder while her left is held by his hand. She has her right hand to her head and leans back on her left elbow. There are traces of garlands round their necks. Their hair is done the same way as on B. Some parts of the scene are as it came from the mould, but much of it is somewhat hastily touched up with a scriber.

B: The scene is again set within a vine arbour and in this case shows a woman riding a man. They rest on a couch covered with drapery. She holds onto a vine-branch with her right hand, while with her left she holds a wool party-fillet. (Another seems to hang from her right arm.) He also has a fillet in his left hand. He pushes against her knee with his right hand. They have garlands about their necks. He is given curly hair, she straighter hair that is drawn into a bun at the back. There seem to be traces of a vessel by the base of the vine behind the man’s head.

Made in Knidos in Asia Minor in the second or third century AD.

NFA Classical Auctions, New York, Sale Cat., 11 December 1991, no. 107 (ill.) [wrongly attributed to North Africa]; Sotheby (New York), Sale Cat., 12 June 1993, no. 364.