SUI DYNASTY (AD 581-619)

This fascinating appliqué is molded with a central male figure with a radiate nimbus flanked by two women. The male’s slouching posture, along with the rhyton and the wineskin scattered on the ground, suggests that this scene may represent a bacchanalia. While the identity of the central figure is uncertain, the scene draws upon Dionysian imagery from the Hellenistic period. The appliqué functioned as a saddle bag that would have adorned either side of a large pottery camel, such as an example with saddlebags molded with an identical scene in the collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art (acc. no. 2000.8).