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Burnished clay bowl, from Abydos

Image attached to E.78.1911

An image of Vessel. Bowl. Clay bowl, made from Nile silt clay. Production Place: Egypt (Nubia). Find Spot: Abydos. Red polish with black top decoration. The interior is also black. The vessel is finger-modelled with horizontal burnishing inside and out. This type of pottery came from burials known as 'Pan-grave', which are shallow graves sometimes re-using earlier burial shafts. Pan-grave was a Nubian culture. This vessel was excavated from the cemetery of Abydos. The vessel has roughly one third missing and the remaining sections have a number of breaks, which have been repaired. Clay, finger-modelled, burnished, diameter 0.175 m, length 0.115 m, circa 1794 to circa 1550 B.C. Second Intermediate period.

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About this image

Vessel. Bowl. Clay bowl, made from Nile silt clay. Production Place: Egypt (Nubia). Find Spot: Abydos. Red polish with black top decoration. The interior is also black. The vessel is finger-modelled with horizontal burnishing inside and out. This type of pottery came from burials known as 'Pan-grave', which are shallow graves sometimes re-using earlier burial shafts. Pan-grave was a Nubian culture. This vessel was excavated from the cemetery of Abydos. The vessel has roughly one third missing and the remaining sections have a number of breaks, which have been repaired. Clay, finger-modelled, burnished, diameter 0.175 m, length 0.115 m, circa 1794 to circa 1550 B.C. Second Intermediate period.

Image data

  • Accession Number: E.78.1911
  • Photograph copyright © The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.
  • Aperture: f/22.0
  • Focal length: 80
  • Camera: Hasselblad H3DII-31
  • Photographer name: Michael Jones
  • Image height: 768 pixels
  • Image width: 1024 pixels
  • Processed with: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5.4 (Windows)
  • Filesize: 57.32kB
  • Exposure time: 1/60
  • ISO Speed: 100
  • Fnumber: 22/1

Key words

Abydos Ancient Egypt antiquity BC black bowl burnished clay Egyptian Fitz_ANT model modelled Nubian pottery red Second Intermediate Period vessel

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The Fitzwilliam Museum (2026) "Burnished clay bowl, from Abydos" Web page available at: https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/image/media-207917 Accessed: 2026-02-14 15:01:59

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{{cite web|url=https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/image/media-207917 |title=Burnished clay bowl, from Abydos |author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2026-02-14 15:01:59|publisher=The University of Cambridge}}

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        <figcaption class="figure-caption text-info">Burnished clay bowl, from Abydos</figcaption>
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