C-Ware – deep bowl, on ring base C-0392
By Droux, Xavier
Archaeological site unknown
Geneva, Musée d'Art et d'Histoire, D1187.
Date : Naqada IA–IIB
General range of C-ware production
Material : Nile silt (Painted)
Preservation : Complete
Decoration preservation : Mostly faded
Preservation information :
Chips on the foot of the vessel.
Decoration
The vessel stands on a circular pedestal. Three hippopotamuses follow each other. The ears, eyes, and incisors protrude from the head; the four legs are short, with three perpendicular lines at their extremities possibly representing the toes. A short tail is painted at the back. Their bodies are filled with chevrons and parallel oblique lines. A long plant, probably the common reed, divides the scene into two parts. A small hatched zigzag is drawn near the bottom; there are four downturned chevrons hanging from the rim.
The exterior of the bowl is decorated with chevrons and series of parallel oblique lines set between double horizontal concentric lines at the top and bottom. The lowest of these horizontal lines connects to the white coating that entirley covers the foot of the vessel.
Dimensions (cm)
7
14.3
14.3
Additional information
Open
Vi 204
Oi 100
on foot
Inside and outside
References
1948
Choix d'objets pré-pharaoniques appartenant à des collections de Suisse. Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale 47
, 13–19.1989
Das Nilpferd in der Vorstellungswelt der alten Ägypter. Teil I, Katalog. Europäische Hochschulschriften VIII, 22. Frankfurt am Main
, doc. 27d.2009
Les peintures sur vases de Nagada I–Nagada II: nouvelle approche sémiologique de l'iconographie prédynastique. Egyptian Prehistory Monographs 6. Leuven
, cat. 70.2015
Riverine and desert animals in predynastic Upper Egypt: material culture and faunal remains. Dphil thesis, University of Oxford. Oxford
, cat.1.35.2022
A pretty happy hippo: pictorial narrativity in the early Naqada Period, in: Sperveslage, Gunnar (ed.), Early Egyptian Miscellanies: discussions and essays on predyastic and early dynastic Egypt. Internet-Beiträge zur Ägyptologie und Sudanarchäologie 26. Berlin, London
, 39–40, fig. 2, no. 070.