Bowl with Hunting Scene (DO BZ.1947.12)
This silver bowl depicts two figures hunting wild cats, represented in a late antique style. Silver plates and bowls were common methods of pictorial display in late antiquity. The circular shape of the bowl helps to create an active composition, which is also aided by the huntress’ distinctly classical and freely-billowing cloak. The identity of the mounted hunter as a woman is less common in later hunting scenes. She may have been understood as the classical goddess Diana or as an Amazon huntress. This depiction of female huntresses also appears in the Textile Roundel with Amazons on Horseback (Dumbarton Oaks BZ.1946.15), which shows two bare-chested women riding horses and hunting wild cats with a bow and arrow, made in Egypt or Syria between the 7th and 9th centuries. Even as Christianity grew more popular in Europe and around the Mediterranean, there remained a cultural and artistic fascination with the heroes and heroines of the classical world.
Bibliography
Hanson, J, “Bowl with Hunting Scene”. Dumbarton Oaks.
http://museum.doaks.org/objects-1/info?query=mfs%20any%20%221947.12%22&sort=9
Luyster, Amanda, “Chapter 2. Chertsey Combat Roundels”, English Bodies, Imported Silks: The
Crusades, the Chertsey Tiles, and the Cosmopolitan Culture of Display, March 31, 2021.
Toynbee, J.M.C. and Painter, K.S., “II. Silver Picture Plates of Late Antiquity: A.D. 300-700”,
Archaeologia, or, Miscellaneous tracts relating to antiquity, London: Society of Antiquaries of London 1770, 78, 1986.