The Portland Vase

The most famous cameo-glass vessel from antiquity , the scenes on the Portland Vase have been interpreted many times with a historical or a mythological slant. It is enough to say that the subject is clearly one of love and marriage with a mythological theme. The ketos (sea-snake) places it in a marine setting. It may have been made as a wedding gift.

It was deposited in The British Museum by the fourth Duke of Portland in 1810 where it remained, apart from three years (1929-32) when it was put up for sale at Christie's, but failed to reach its reserve. It was purchased by the Museum from the seventh duke of Portland in 1945.

The bottom of the vase was probably broken in antiquity. It is likely that it originally ended in a point like a fine cameo-glass vessel from Pompeii. A cameo-glass disc, showing a pensive Priam, was attached to the bottom from at least 1826, but it clearly does not belong to the vase, and has been displayed separately since 1845.

Cameo-glass vessels were probably all made within about two generations as experiments when the blowing technique (discovered in about 50 BC) was still in its infancy. Recent research has shown that the Portland vase, like the majority of cameo-glass vessels, was made by the dip-overlay method, whereby an elongated bubble of glass was partially dipped into a crucible (fire-resistant container) of white glass, before the two were blown together. After cooling the white layer was cut away to form the design. The cutting was probably performed by a skilled gem-cutter.
AD 5-25

British Museum, London.
April 2013.