Image: Samarra bowl

Description: The Samarra bowl (ca. 4000 BC) at on exhibit at the Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin. The bowl was excavated as Samarra by Ernst Herzfeld in the 1911-1914 campaign, and described in a 1930 publication. The design consists of a rim, a circle of eight fish, and four fish swimming towards the center being caught by four birds. As is typical of cultures from this region, the use of a base six numerical system can be seen in the lines surrounding the bowl, so that there are a total of 120 lines, or four quarters with 30 lines each. At the center is a swastika symbol. The bowl was broken, part of the rim is missing, and one crack ran right across the central symbol, so that the swastika symbol should be considered a reconstruction. Literature: Ernst Herzfeld, Die vorgeschichtlichen Töpfereien von Samarra, Die Ausgrabungen von Samarra 5, Berlin 1930. Stanley A. Freed, Research Pitfalls as a Result of the Restoration of Museum Specimens, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Volume 376, The Research Potential of Anthropological Museum Collections pages 229–245, December 1981
Title: Samarra bowl
Credit: Self-photographed
Author: Dbachmann
Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0
License: CC BY-SA 4.0
License Link: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0
Attribution Required?: Yes