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Circular Impressed Disk
View through Harvard Museums
This intact terracotta circular disk, with a rectangular pierced tang at the bottom, bears the impression of more than two dozen symbols. From top to bottom, starting with the upper register, the objects can be identified as a grape bunch over a crescent moon, tongs, two amphorae or kantharoi flanking three distaffs (for spinning) above an owl, and a four-spoked wheel; in the second register, there is a distaff with wool wound around it, a club, trident, distaff, caduceus, patera or offering bread, lighting bolt, scabbard, torch with flame arching to the right, and a ladder-shape, possibly an Apulian sistrum (a type of musical instrument). In the third register, there are three round offering cakes, a wavy symbol that could be a bow or serpent or cuttlefish above a square tablet, a lyre above an open hand, a bird (an eagle or a dove) facing right above an infinity symbol (either an open box mirror or cymbals) above a strigil or Egyptian sistrum, next to two difficult to read objects, of which one might be an oil flask.
Department of Ancient and Byzantine Art & Numismatics
Taranto Italy (before 1924) purchase; by Walton Brooks McDaniel New Jersey (?-1943/46) gift; to the Department of the Classics Harvard University (1943/46-2012) transfer; to the Harvard Art Museums 2012.
Note: Walton Brooks McDaniel gave a portion of his collection to the Department of the Classics in 1943 and the rest in 1946. The Collection is named for his late wife Alice Corinne McDaniel.
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum Transfer from the Alice Corinne McDaniel Collection Department of the Classics Harvard University
Title: Circular Impressed Disk
Description:
This intact terracotta circular disk, with a rectangular pierced tang at the bottom, bears the impression of more than two dozen symbols.
From top to bottom, starting with the upper register, the objects can be identified as a grape bunch over a crescent moon, tongs, two amphorae or kantharoi flanking three distaffs (for spinning) above an owl, and a four-spoked wheel; in the second register, there is a distaff with wool wound around it, a club, trident, distaff, caduceus, patera or offering bread, lighting bolt, scabbard, torch with flame arching to the right, and a ladder-shape, possibly an Apulian sistrum (a type of musical instrument).
In the third register, there are three round offering cakes, a wavy symbol that could be a bow or serpent or cuttlefish above a square tablet, a lyre above an open hand, a bird (an eagle or a dove) facing right above an infinity symbol (either an open box mirror or cymbals) above a strigil or Egyptian sistrum, next to two difficult to read objects, of which one might be an oil flask.
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