Delicately shaped, adorned with the simplest of geometric patterns, this ancient vessel may originally have contained precious oils, perfumes or medicines. Aesthetically, its appeal is timeless, with fluid contours that speak to modern sensibilities as they surely did to ancient ones. It is remarkable that a functional object should be so beautiful. As we hold it today by its handle, we are aware that others held it similarly centuries before. Across the barriers of time and culture, we are intimately linked with their vanished world.