Workshop Gries/Fügert

Glazed Brick Decoration in the Ancient Near East

Organizers: Anja Fügert (Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin) / Helen Gries (Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin)

Abstract

During the last decade a number of excavations yielded new evidence for glazed bricks and its decoration in the Iron Age public architecture of the Ancient Near East, and also the work on glazed bricks excavated around a hundred years ago, nowadays stored in various museum collections was revived.
One main topic will be the use of glazed bricks and their positioning in the decoration of public buildings of the 1st millennium BC. The spectrum of the varied imagery of glazed brick façades and panels in temples and palaces shall be presented and compared, in order to better understand the underlying visual concepts.
The workshop “Glazed Brick Decoration in the Ancient Near East” furthermore aims to establish a network for researchers working on glazed bricks in order to exchange information and experience on scientific analysis methods, appropriate conservation measures, optical imaging and visualisation techniques. The focus will be laid on the development of glazing technologies from the early Neo-Assyrian time onwards. The brick manufacturing processes, the use and variety of fitter’s marks, epigraphic and figural stamp impressions and other auxiliary marks could be discussed. Another possible area to focus on could be the interconnection between the availability of the glaze ingredients, the state of the glazing technology and the development of the color range through time.

Participants

Negar Abdali (University of Heidelberg)
Anja Fügert (Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin)
Helen Gries (Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin)
Parviz Holakooei (Art University of Isfahan)
Manuela Lehmann (British Museum London)
Olof Pedersén (Uppsala University)
Katharina Schmidt, Deutsches Evangelisches Institut für Altertumswissenschaft, Amman
Sebastiano Soldi (National Archaeological Museum, Florence / University of Tübingen)
Nigel Tallis (British Museum London)
Ariane Thomas (Louvre Paris)

Program
Glaze Technology
9:00 Parviz Holakooei: Glaze Technology in the Iron Age Iran and Iraq: An Overview
9:30 Katharina Schmidt: Iron Age Mesopotamian Glass Technology
Glazed Bricks from Iran and Babylonia
10:00 Olof Pedersén: Glazed Brick Decoration in Babylon
10:30 Negar Abdali: An Introduction to the Technical Analysis of Iranian Glazes from the Middle Elamite to the Achaemenid Period. Case Study: The Turquoise Glaze from Qalaichi
11:00 Coffee break
Glazed Bricks from Assyria
11: 30 Anja Fügert/Helen Gries: The Reconstruction of the Glazed Brick Facades from Ashur in the Vorderasiatisches Museum (GlAssur-Project)
12:00 Manuela Lehmann/Nigel Tallis: Glazed Tiles From Nimrud And The Visual Narrative Of Esarhadon’s Egyptian Campaign
12:30 Ariane Thomas: Glazed Bricks from Khorsabad
13:00 Lunch break
14:00 Sebastiano Soldi: Glazed Architectural Ceramics in the Iron Age Northern Levant: Two Case Studies from Zincirli and Tell Afis
14:30 Final Discussion