Red-Polished Ware Bowl with Modeled Figures

Hand-modelled figures adorn the rim of this Red Polished Ware bowl. Bulls embodied fertility and strength, and appear on this vessel both as a complete animal and as horned bovine heads atop poles. Interspersed between them are two miniature bowls on short stems and a long-necked water bird. The two bowls replicate the shape of the full-sized vessel they decorate.

Early Bronze Age Cyprus (about 2400-1600 B.C.), defined by the local Philia culture that originated in Anatolia (present-day western Turkey), saw the introduction of novel technologies and agricultural production, burial practices, and pottery styles. The ubiquitous Red Polished Ware, handmade from mineral-rich clay and named for its ruddy color and lustrous surface, was a hallmark of the local craft tradition. Vessels with three-dimensional human and animal attachments and scenes of daily life have been found primarily in funerary contexts. Rather than simply burial goods, however, dining wares found in graves may also be associated with feasts, which were celebrated by the living to commemorate and recognize the passage of the deceased.