Where did this go?
Where our harpy bowl ended up:
The bowl's journey (~1250-1958):
Ceramic bowls are portable and were regularly traded along extensive trade routes in the eastern Mediterranean. This is especially true for our bowl, made near the port city, Chersonesus. Many shipwrecks within the Black Sea are dated back to the twelfth and thirteenth century. Ceramics that moved on ships over the Black Sea are similar in their technique to our harpy bowl. Here is an example of a Byzantine bowl from the 11th-13th century that was found in a shipwreck along a major Byzantine trade route.
Our harpy bowl may have been exported by ship to a faraway medieval purchaser, or it could have used by a medieval buyer in Chersonesus. In 1958 this bowl was purchased by Dumbarton Oaks from the art dealer and collector, George Zacos. Mr. Zacos may have purchased the bowl somewhere in Turkey, perhaps in Istanbul. Mr. Zacos sold many Byzantine artifacts to museums like Dumbarton Oaks, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the British Museum.