Amathus Vase
Unknown · Cypro-Archaic, seventh to fifth century BC
A stone jar nearly two metres high and more than three metres across, cut from a single block of the local limestone, dominates the room. Its round body rests on a low foot, and four massive handles are attached by capitals of the proto-Aeolic type, the curling volutes crowned with a palmette that Cypriot builders borrowed from the Levant. In the hollow of each handle stands a bull walking to the right. On one handle, in front of the bull's head, a few signs of the Cypriot syllabary are scratched in the local language, Eteocypriot. Look at the tool marks that still cover the inside of the bowl.
The vase stood on the acropolis of Amathus, probably in the sanctuary of the great goddess whom the Cypriots identified with Astarte and Aphrodite, and may have held water or offerings for the cult. Its date, between the seventh and fifth centuries before Christ, rests on the style of the handles. In eighteen sixty-five it was removed by the French mission of Melchior de Vogüé and shipped to Paris, one of the heaviest objects in the Louvre and the only monument of its kind in any museum.
Did You Know? The vase weighs around fourteen tonnes, and its twin, which cracked when workers tried to move it, still lies on the acropolis of Amathus.
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