This bowl currently belongs to the Dumbarton Oaks Collection in Washington DC.  Dumbarton Oaks acquired it from the Byzantine Institute of America. The Byzantine Institute was founded by Thomas Whittemore in 1930. As a founder, his goal was to conserve, restore, and study the art of the Byzantine Empire. In 1968, Paul Atkins Underwood took over the Institute’s fieldwork and began restoring the Hagia Sophia and Kariye Camii in Istanbul, Turkey. 

Hagia Sophia was built as a Byzantine church and later converted into a mosque. It was converted into a museum by the President of Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. President Ataturk also granted the Byzantine Institute permission to restore the original mosaics in the Hagia Sophia. In 2020 it was converted into a mosque again.

The Kariye Camii is one of the oldest religious buildings of Byzantine Constantinople or modern-day Istanbul. The building had numerous functions throughout history ranging from a Christian monastery to a mosque. The original name of the Church was the Chora monastery. Kariye is an Arabic word meaning “countryside.” 

In 2004, Professor Holger Klein of Columbia University curated an exhibition named “Restoring Byzantium: The Rediscovery and Restoration of the Kariye Camii,” which displayed the “Byzantine or Crusader Bowl."