Background & Challenge

Rachel Boertjens, Curator at Special Collections, University of Amsterdam, provided background information on the object and a challenge for the team:

The Allard Pierson Museum holds a beautiful magic ceramic bowl with Aramaic text from Mesopotamia from the sixth century. Like other magic bowls and amulets found in that region, the bowl was made to protect the home and its inhabitants from evil spirits. Magic bowls were buried upside down or in pairs against each other to catch the demons rising from the underworld. The Aramaic text is written in a spiral pattern and includes the names of the people who need protection along with divine names, the names of the demons, angels, spirits as well as a some magical words. In the center of the bowl there are three magic signs.

I think the challenge concerning displaying this object lies in the mystery surrounding the making and the burial of a bowl like this. The bowl is visually speaking quite attractive, but gets kept under ground. There are many options for presentation of this bowl; light versus dark, magic, text and the meaning of letters, the form of the letters and how together they create another form, religion versus culture, etcetera.