The reddish-grey earthenware fragment comes from a vessel that was provided with a slightly convex strainer. The lattice of this strainer is a geometrical design composed of circles and curved lines. The basic unit of the pattern is a circle filled with a four-sided border bent inwards to form a star with a holed circlet at the centre and four circles in the middle of the sides. The whole design is composed of three of these circles. The space between them is filled with a pointed motif flanked by two tiny holed circlets, which repeats a section of the basic pattern. An incised zigzag line bordered by two curved lines surrounds the openwork at the centre. The zigzag line is a characteristic element of Fatimid strainer designs.
The strainer was placed at the juncture of neck and shoulder of an earthenware vessel to protect the stored liquid from insects and pollution. Most strainer vessels of the Islamic period were manufactured of clay. The vessels remained unglazed in order to allow evaporation through the porous material, if it was wished to keep the stored liquid, mostly water, cool.
Designs put together on the basis of simple geometrical shapes such as circles, lines or triangles, the repetition of these elements and their rearrangement in new patterns are a feature of Fatimid strainers. Geometrical compositions are dominant among the strainer designs of this period followed by zoomorphic and epigraphic motifs. Decorative strainers are known from excavations from the AH 2nd / AD 8th century to the AH 9th / AD 15th century, but Fatimid period was the high point of their development.
Source: [https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;ISL;se;Mus01;49;en&cp]
How date and origin were established:
Strainers of this pattern excavated in undisturbed strata were dated to the 5th and 6th / 11th and 12th centuries.
How Object was obtained:
Purchased from the collection of the Swedish art dealer and art historian F. R. Martin in 1921.
How provenance was established:
Similar strainers were excavated at al-Fustat and their place of manufacture ascribed to the city. According to F. R. Martin, this strainer comes from excavations at al-Fustat.
Source: [https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=object;ISL;se;Mus01;49;en&cp]
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