To apply the term ‘Kushan art’ is to reductively clump together the many diverse artistic traditions embraced by the Kushan Empire. The Kushans themselves originated in Chinese Turkestan or China itself, They were one of the five aristocratic tribes of the Yue-zhi People, nomadic pastoralists who lived on the grassland steppes of what is now north-western China. They migrated south, travelling thousands of miles, until in 135 BC, they encountered the Graeco-Bactrian Kingdom, in modern Afghanistan and Pakistan. They displaced these Greeks, forcing them south to the Hindu Kush, and established their own territorial empire based on the Greek cities. Under the Kushans were regions as diverse as Gandhara – the famous Graeco-Buddhist culture, which produced some of the most spectacular art in South Asia – the Hindu regions of north India, the nomadic Uzbeks, and Iranian peoples. The Kushans responded not by suppressing these cultures, and trying to impose a ‘Kushan’ identity, but rather by embracing them. From their Graeco-Bactrian subjects, they adopted the Greek alphabet (with the addition of the letter sh, which did not exist in Greek), and Greek-style coinage, which presented the Kushan monarch as a Hellenistic god-king. From their other subjects, they adopted diverse artistic traditions and a wealth of religions, including Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, and Hindu Shaivism, as well as a number of Greek gods.

This extraordinary bowl is a representation of the syncretism at the heart of the Kushan cultural experience. It is of an attractive globular shape, with a mostly rounded bottom, a vertical neck, an everted rim, and three delicately modelled handles. The decoration is characteristically Kushan, with umber or red figures outlined in black, with black details, all contrasted with the natural lightness of the clay. From the very top, the influence of the Kushan’s Greek subjects can be seen; around the neck is a version of the Greek meander (maiandros) pattern, which incorporates the swastika element – at the time associated with good fortune and positive energy in the Hindu and Buddhist faiths. The main decorative scheme consists of six roundels, three containing images of people, and three of animals. The deer is perhaps the easiest of the animals to identify, with remarkable antlers springing from his head; but he also has a number of fanciful or decorative adaptations, including a curving tuft of hair from his forehead. The other animals are harder to identify; one particularly lithe animal, looking over its shoulder, could well be a gazelle, or perhaps a female deer. Equally, this figure could represent a dragon or similar mythological creature, given the unusual features including a leaf-shaped tongue and long rope-like tail. The final animal appears to be a predatory creature, with sharp teeth, some sort of mane, and stripes down its body. This may well be a lion, which were important symbols for the Kushans, but it may also represent a mythological creature about which we know nothing. In the three smaller roundels, which alternate with the larger, are people in poses of adoration or worship. They wear flared skirts, and stand with their arms raised. The presence of beards indicates that these people are male, and perhaps are important religious officials. Around both the people and the animals are vegetal and abstract motifs, including chain patterns, ‘snakes’, some with triangular heads, and a number of geometric shapes.

Kushan pottery rarely survives, and intact examples are rarer still. The zoomorphic representations on much pottery harkens back to the Kushans’ nomadic past, where following the herds was a way of life, and their existence was driven by the rhythms of the natural world. As the Kushans absorbed their Indian and Greek subjects, these animal representations took on new significances, as they became associated with the spirits and demons of, especially, the Hindu faith. Whether these representations have anything to do with the purpose of our bowl or not remains a mystery; could this magnificent bowl have been used for religious ceremonies? Or was it merely a decorative object for a higher-class Kushan individual?