Glass sprinkler flask with snake-thread decroation

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent light blue green; base ring and trail in same color. Outsplayed rim, folded down, round, and in; slanting, funnel-shaped mouth; short, cylindrical neck, with folded diaphragm at base; conical body with straight side, then curving in sharply; applied, solid base ring; low kick in bottom with small pontil scar at center. A single continuous trail wound around body in a sinuous pattern, partially flattened and decorated with close-set tooled notches. Intact; a few pinprick and elongated bubbles, and blowing striations; slight dulling and small patches of limy encrustation and iridescent weathering on exterior, larger patches of soil encrustation, weathering, and brilliant iridescence on exterior. Although the snake-thread decoration seen here is found on Roman glassware throughout the Empire, the shape of this flask belongs firmly in the eastern tradition. It has a constriction at the base of the neck that allowed the contents to be poured out only in drops and so has become known as a sprinkler flask.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.

Metropolitan Museum of Art