Works of Art
Cycladic Marble Kandila
Period: Cycladic I, Early 3rd Millennium B.C.
Culture: Cycladic, Greek World
Category: Array
Dimensions: Height: 18.4 cm
Price: CHF 69000, USD 69000
Provenance: Ex-French private collection
Condition: Almost intact, the handles are partially damaged.
Description
This kandila is almost intact: only the handles are partially damaged. It is carved out of a white marble with gray veins: the sculptor skillfully exploited the two colors and the circular veins of the stone to “decorate" his work. Like other white-gray marble objects, this bowl could have originated from the island of Syros. The lithics industry of the Cyclades did not only use white marble, especially for the production of containers: these objects, which were carved in other stones such as steatite, gray marble, schist, etc., are well attested to, even if quantitatively these vessels are rare compared to the white marble pieces.
The kandiles and the slightly hollow plates are the most well known shapes from the canon of Cycladic marble vessels. This form is composed of three elements: the globular body with the narrow flat shoulder, the truncated neck with a small round lip and the triangular foot. The four small vertical handles each present a small hole at the center which was used to suspend and/or transport the container using a cord. Their function is currently unknown; the examples whose provenance is known were found in necropoleis, but traces of use as well as visible repairs on some of them (especially on the handles), indicate that they were not manufactured only for graves. In addition, one must bring attention to the impractical shape of these containers: the small ones have a very limited capacity, while the largest are extremely heavy (more than 20 kg).
Thus, one can suppose that before being deposited in the tomb, they were used for rites or by cults, which were probably in connection with the funerary sphere.
The name attributed today to these vases comes from their completely fortuitous resemblance with the oil lamps which light orthodox churches. In the late 1940s, three prehistoric kandiles were still being used in the Panaghia Katapoliani Cathedral, on the island of Paros.
Bibliography
BARBER R.N.L., The Cyclades in the Bronze Age, London, 1987.
THIMME J. (éd.), Art and Culture of the Cyclades, Karslruhe, 1977.
On the stone vessels of the Cyclades:
GETZ-GENTLE P., Stone Vessels of the Cyclades in the Early Bronze Age, Madison Wisconsin, 1996 (pp. 5-39 on the kandiles).