Beaker12th-13th century

Not on view

Title: Beaker
Place Made: Eastern Mediterranean
Date Made: 12th-13th century
Medium: Glass, free-blown and tooled, with applied decoration
Dimensions: Height: 5 7/16 in. (13.81 cm); Diameter: 3 15/16 in. (10 cm)
Credit Line: The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost
Accession Number: M.2002.1.501
Classification: Glass
Collecting Area: Art of the Middle East: Islamic
Curatorial Notes: Cylindrical beakers with elegantly flaring rims are especially typical of Syrian glass production during the Ayyubid and early Mamluk periods. This distinctive shape was decorated in a variety of techniques—such as enameling, gilding, and marvering—or, as in this example, with multiple applied trailed threads of opaque turquoise glass. Such Syrian beakers must have been widely exported throughout the Islamic lands and beyond, to judge by the many regional renditions of this shape, including those created by Venetian glassmakers.
Selected Bibliography: Komaroff, Linda. Beauty and Identity: Islamic Art from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2016.

Related Unframed

Not on view

Title: Beaker
Place Made: Eastern Mediterranean
Date Made: 12th-13th century
Medium: Glass, free-blown and tooled, with applied decoration
Dimensions: Height: 5 7/16 in. (13.81 cm); Diameter: 3 15/16 in. (10 cm)
Credit Line: The Madina Collection of Islamic Art, gift of Camilla Chandler Frost
Accession Number: M.2002.1.501
Classification: Glass
Collecting Area: Art of the Middle East: Islamic
Curatorial Notes: Cylindrical beakers with elegantly flaring rims are especially typical of Syrian glass production during the Ayyubid and early Mamluk periods. This distinctive shape was decorated in a variety of techniques—such as enameling, gilding, and marvering—or, as in this example, with multiple applied trailed threads of opaque turquoise glass. Such Syrian beakers must have been widely exported throughout the Islamic lands and beyond, to judge by the many regional renditions of this shape, including those created by Venetian glassmakers.
Selected Bibliography: Komaroff, Linda. Beauty and Identity: Islamic Art from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2016.