27

the goblet of the Ritter von Launa in Prague, plate XXXI;
hut especially with the blue lamp of the Amir Arghun,
a copy of which is in the Musee des Arts Decoratifs.*
Thus we may conjecture that it was made according to
order in Syria, probably in Damascus or Aleppo.
We have already remarked that the group of bottles
and of vases with handles, is more various and manifold
than that of the lamps, as well in torm as in the manner
of decoration.
In treating of the lamps adorned with enamel and gold
which are known to us—leaving aside the small full-gilt
lamp, fig. 20, and the lamp of Arghun—we have recognised
only two types of form, namely the lamp with a foot-stand,
and the lamp without it.-p Among the bottles and the
vases with handles, varieties of shape are much more
frequent.
The bottles or flasks may be divided primarily into two
classes : the round and the flattened. The former again
falls into two groups : those with a high foot-stand,
and those with a simple foot-rim. Those with the high
foot-stand (usually much hollowed out) have generally
a very long and slender neck, which at about two-thirds
of its height (as on plate XXIX), and frequently even
higher (as in Fig. 22) is, for the purpose of equilibrium,
ringed with a necklet or collar which often projects strongly
outward. (The particular manner of this formation is
shown in the profiles 1 and 2 of Fig. 42.) On the contrary,
in the vessels which rest on a low flat support, and which
are usually very big-bellied, the neck is somewhat shorter,
is narrower at the spring of the throat, and has no collar
(fig. 5, and plates VI and XXV). The body of the rounded
vessel is always broadest in the lowest third of its height;
and from that point it is conically narrowed upwards and
downwards, the upper recession being made with a more or
less protuberant surface, the lower one hollowed in concave
fashion. The only exception to be mentioned here is the
Amphora (plate XIII) of the Treasury of St. Stephan's at
Vienna, which is provided with a special and peculiar
mouth-piece, and has handles; by reason of which it varies
from all other rounded vessels, and claims a distinct place
for itself.
The flattened vessels, the so-called field-bottles, or as
they are styled in England, " pilgrims' bottles "—this last
expression being a remarkably apt one, since the vessels in
question were generally brought from the Holy Land by
pilgrims—are divided into two groups, according to their
* See the etching in the Gazette des Beaux Arts, as already cited.
t The Mus4e National de l'Art Arabe in Cairo comprises a three-
handled, globular lamp (Herz Catalogue, No. 7) without that ornament; of
which the age is questionable.

shape : namely, those with handles and those without
handles. Both sorts are footless, but have the base indented,
to enable them to stand securely,—this being the only way
in which they were intended to be placed. Those without
handles are of smaller, or it may even be said, of very small
dimensions, as in the instance of the tiny flagon or pilgrim's
bottle which belongs to Hakki Bey (fig. 6); and the neck,
which is moderately long, and a little swollen just above
the point of junction with the body, has a very narrow
mouth-orifice. These vessels were probably perfume-bottles,
or meant to hold rose-water. (It is generally known that
Orientals like to have their drinking water scented.)
Of the pilgrims' bottles with handles, we reproduce on
plates IV, IVA, XX, and XXA, two superbly fine pieces.
In the large one from St. Stephan's Treasury at Vienna,
the formation of the neck is especially remarkable; in the
so-called Wurzburg vessel in the British Museum, it is the
profile or side view which attracts attention. The shape of
the bottle ensured for it the greatest measure of capacity,
and enabled it to lie most commodiously when it was hung
up. The shape was probably also the efficient cause of the
manner, unique in its variety, in which the ornamentation
of this lordly piece of glasswork is carried ont (plate XXI).
Amongst the vessels with handles, there are again two
sorts : the double-handled and the single-handled.
On plate V we reproduce the bladder-shaped vase of
the first sort, in the possession of Tigrane Pasha in Cairo A
The thick neck opening funnel-wise, appears to characterise
the vessel as a flower-vase ; while, on the contrary, the
single-handled vessel on plate XXX—a small jug in the
collection of Baron Alphonse de Rothschild in Paris—
seems decidedly to belong to the division of table-glass.
This rare piece s has, unlike all the other vessels of the
group, a globular body very slightly depressed in its vertical
extension, with a broad neck widening like a funnel, which
is inwardly of peculiar formation, and displays outwardly
a remarkable ornamental design in plastic application.
(See the profile 5, fig. 42.)
* One of similar kind, but somewhat more bigbellied, in the collection
of Ch. Schefer in Paris, has been reproduced in chromolithography, but not
happily, by Presse d'Avcnnes in his L'Art Arabe. Marvellously enough,
he considered it to be Venetian work and of the seventeenth century !
t Besides the little jug in question, we know of only one single-handled
vessel of this group. It is reproduced in the Gazette des Beaux Arts,
2" periode, tome XXXII, p. 801, as an illustration of the article by Henri
Lavoix on Albert Goupil's collection. This bottle is bladder-shaped, lanky,
and without any figured decoration. In the character of the ornament on
the neck, it strongly resembles the little jug; but in the net-like expansion
of the ornament on the body it reminds us rather of the amphora on plate
XIII, save that this ornament is not composed of straight lines, and that it
also covers the lower surface of the body. The inscription refers to some
person belonging to the court of a prince " an-Nasir." The attenuated
characters of the script indicate, in the opinion of Lavoix, a rather late period.