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A note on three glass plaques from Hasanlu1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Maude de Schauensee
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Extract

This note on three unpublished glass inlay plaques from a badly burned and fragmentary alabaster pedestal cup (Fig. 1) found in the period IVB (late 9th c. BC) level at Hasanlu is offered as an addendum to John Curtis's article “Glass Inlays and Nimrud Ivories” in a recent issue of Iraq. The pieces are of interest because their method of manufacture appears to differ greatly from those published in the Iraq article.

The Nimrud plaques and two of the three Hasanlu plaques, Plaques A and B (Fig. 2a), show rosettes or flowers. While the use of a flower motif, and perhaps its significance, is similar, the similarity ends there. The third Hasanlu plaque, Plaque C (Fig. 2a), is unlike the other two. It had no identifiable decorative design and was inlaid with a circular piece (now missing) near the center.

The Nimrud plaques are many in number and were purposefully made for their function as inlay pieces. However, the three found at Hasanlu were cut from two or more larger objects for reuse as inlays in the alabaster cup along with carnelian and Egyptian Blue beads and a broken glass bead (Fig. 3a, b). The decorated obverse surfaces of Hasanlu Plaques A and B appear to have been made by the mosaic technique. Unlike the petals on the Nimrud plaques, which are now a uniform opaque white glass, the petals on Plaques A and B have a central section of glass of one color outlined by glass of the same consistency but of another color. The round center of the flower is yet another color.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 63 , 2001 , pp. 99 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 2001

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Footnotes

1

The author would like lo thank Dr Robert H. Dyson, Jr, Director of the Hasanlu Project, for suggesting that she publish this note on the glass plaques from Hasanlu and for his helpful suggestions. However, the opinions expressed in this paper are solely the responsibility of the author.

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