Bulla
An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art
This lump of clay, called a ‘bulla,’ bears four impressions of the same oval stamp seal (possibly from a signet ring), featuring an image of a moth. Given its condition it is not clear to what it was attached originally, but it may have been a stopper in the mouth of a jar. Seals were ancient accounting tools, used for example to indicate who supplied a commodity, who was responsible for its disbursement, or who received it. In this case, the seal impressions may indicate who supplied the contents of the jar. Once the jar was opened, the bulla was discarded. This bulla was excavated at Shahr-i Qumis in northern Iran, which has been identified as the ancient city of Hecatompylos, established by the Parthians as the capital of their empire by about 200 B.C. In Greek Hecatompylos means ‘a hundred gates,’ suggesting that the city was quite large. Indeed, the modern archaeological site includes several mounds, only a few of which have been excavated, and a vast area covered with potsherds. This bulla was found in a large building at Site V, which has been tentatively identified as an elite residence. This building was completely filled with dirt sometime in the late 1st century B.C. or early 1st century A.D., perhaps when the Parthian capital was moved elsewhere and the city’s elite residents left with it. The excavations at Shahr-i Qumis by the British Institute of Persian Studies in 1967 were co-sponsored by the Metropolitan Museum of Art. However, this bulla was not discovered until 1971, and it was acquired from the British Institute as a result of the Met’s financial contributions to the Institute’s excavations at Tepe Nush-i Jan, another site in Iran. At the time the Iranian government allowed foreign excavators to keep a portion of the finds, and these excavators in turn would divide their share among the institutions that supported the work.
Ancient Near Eastern Art
An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Met's Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art cares for approximately 7,000 works ranging in date from the eighth millennium B.C. through the centuries just beyond the emergence of Islam in the seventh century A.D. Objects in the collection were created by people in the area that today comprises Iraq, Iran, Turkey, Syria, the Eastern Mediterranean coast, Yemen, and Central Asia. From the art of some of the world's first cities to that of great empires, the department's holdings illustrate the beauty and craftsmanship as well as the profound interconnections, cultural and religious diversity, and lasting legacies that characterize the ancient art of this vast region.