# Palettes Database

Description:
Sitting Buddha in dhyana-mudra next to two adorants


Description:
In this roundel, the lady arranging her hair in a mirror may be the goddess Aphrodite, attended by an eros.


Description:
This roundel depicts the goddess Hariti, protectress of children, holding a child on her lap.


Description:
Palette with Nereids, or sea nymphs, riding ketoi, or sea monsters


Description:
Part of a palette or toilet-tray, depicting a hippocamp


Description:
Fragment of a circular palette or toilet-tray, carved in fine grey steatite with a shallow central depression and at the edges with an antelope and a conch shell within a beaded rim.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, carved in grey schist with four standing female figures, the central pair apparently undressing.


Description:
Stone roundel (possibly a palette) carved in low relief. Depiction of a human figure riding a mythical animal.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, carved in grey schist with a hippocampus.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, made of green steatite and depicting a person riding a hippocamp.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, in grey schist, depicting a banquet scene.


Description:
A palette or 'toilet tray' decorated inside the dish area with a person riding a hippocamp.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray (half only remains), carved in schist with a hunter? flanked by a boar and a lion.


Description:
Fragment of circular palette or toilet tray carved in schist with two rectangular compartments; the lower compartment shows two damaged figures (drinking?).


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, carved in black schist with a person riding a hippocamp; beaded edge.


Description:
A cosmetic-palette or 'toilet tray', decorated in the dish area with a standing humped bull and lion with a raised paw and on the convex back with a lotus flower in high relief.


Description:
Dish or palette. Fragment made of stone, with a naked woman and her lover flanked by attendants; damaged with outer rim broken away in four places.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray in yellow steatite, depicting the myth of Artemis and Actaeon.


Description:
A cosmetic-palette or toilet-tray in grey-green steatite, carved crudely on the interior upper surface with a standing lion in low relief and on the bottom with concentric circles and a central rectangular depression.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, carved in schist with a Nereid riding a seamonster.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray carved in grey steatite with a battle between a lion and a bull.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray carved in grey schist into nine sections with a drinking couple in the centre space.


Description:
A palette or toilet-tray, carved in schist into four sections with lotus petals, a beaded inner rim and with two figures in the upper sections.


Description:
Circular palette or toilet tray, carved in yellow steatite with a carefully grooved rim, projecting moulded lip and a smooth underside.  One side show Aphrodite smacking Eros, the other shows Harpokrates.


Description:
Dish. Damaged, made of stone showing part of 2 horses.


Description:
Chlorite cosmetic-dish; light greenish grey; carved in high relief with the upper portion of a human figure represented; fragment.


Description:
The upper section of this ornate cosmetic palette depicts a marine monster called a makara. The creature, apparently derived from its Greco-Roman equivalent called a ketos, has a snake-like body, wings, and a dragon’s head.

Other:
The palette itself is divided into three sections, all of which have a low relief lotus design in the background. The upper part, covering half the palette, features the makara, while the smaller lower quarter sections are empty and were probably used to store cosmetics.


Description:
owl with a Medallion Depicting Dionysos and Ariadne

Other:
The type of the vessel occurs first in the late third or early second century B.c. and was used in the Hellenized East even in Imperial times.


Description:
Ritual Tray with a Nereid (Sea Nymph) and a Cherub Riding a Sea Monster (Ketos)


Museum Location:
Samuel Eilenberg Collection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Description:
Fragment of a Dish with Aphrodite Emerging from Her Bath

Citation(s):
Martin and Kossak, 1991, Bernherdt, 2007


Description:
Fragment of a Dish with a Sea Monster Bearing a Female


Other:
This dish from the ancient region of Gandhara dates from the second century B.C. to the first century A.D. International trade with the Hellenistic world and India as well as invasions into Gandhara by the Scythians, Parthians, and Kushans brought many new stylistic idioms that shaped the stylistic vocabulary of these objects. Similar dishes were found in the Gandharan city of Sirkap (Taxila) in contexts that suggest they were used for domestic rituals, perhaps to ensure a positive afterlife.


Citation(s):
Martin and Kossak, 1991, Bernherdt, 2007, Stone, 2004


Description:
Dish with Winged Eros Riding a Lion-Headed Sea Monster


Description:
Dish with Drunken Herakles Embracing Two Women


Description:
Dish with the Drunken Hercules Supported by Two Women and Flanked by a Lion


Citation(s):
Martin and Kossak, 1991, Bernherdt, 2007, Kim, 2019


Description:
Dish with a Mythological Couple (Perhaps Apollo and Daphne)


Description:
Dish with a Sea Monster and Marine Deity


Description:
Dish with Hercules Battling the Nemean Lion(?)


Description:
The goddess wears a sleeved garment with a striped cloak over it, falling to the knees-probably a version of a himation draped over shoulders and upper body.

Other:
She holds a shallow bowl on the fingertips of her right hand. The monster is the classical ketos, with ears, finny gills, flippers and fish tail. It turns its head back towards her.

Citation(s):
Errington and Cribb, 1992, Francfort, 1979


Description:
A woman struggling with a bearded man. This probably derives from classical mythology common in Hellenistic art where the subject of a nymph being ravished by a satyr is a common one.

Other:
Attribution note: The stone has been identified by Mr. Jobbins of the Geological Museum as Pyrophyllite with a little kaolinite as impurity. 2.12.1960.


Description:
Cosmetic dish decorated with a figure riding a water monster based on Roman representations of a Nereid riding a sea monster, but perhaps influenced by Indian conceptiions of the Makara- a creature like a crocodile.

Other:
Cosmetic dish decorated with a figure riding a water monster based on Roman representations of a Nereid riding a sea monster, but perhaps influenced by Indian conceptiions of the Makara- a creature like a crocodile.


Other:
The upper compartment shows two figures holding goblets; the lower half is divided into two compartments, decorated with a lotus pattern. depicted The rim has series of small circles and the back is plain.


Description:
A cosmetic dish, divided into two compartments of which the upper occupies about three quarters of the full area. This is filled with an elaborate carving showing a group of five figures.

Other:
In the centre a man making an offering at an altar; on his right there are woman and a girl with a bowl and on his left a man and a boy who also holds a bowl. It might be taken to represent a priest officiating on behalf of the family there assembled.


Description:
A dish with a relief of an erotic scene.

Other:
A cosmetic dish shwoing an amorous couple on a couch, waited upon by an attendant. Reputedly from the mound "But Khak", near Hadda, Afghanisthan,


Description:
Cosmetic dish with upper portion showing a carving of a woman seated on a sea-monster.

Other:
he lower part, which occupies less than half its total area is broken away.


Description:
The upper portion shows a carving of a man and woman. She rests her right arm along his shoulders, while he makes a conversational gesture with his right hand.

Other:
Buchthal has shown how this arrangement is a close copy of a husband and wife on the lid of a a Roman sarcophagus. A lotus pattern fills the two lower compartments, and is repeated on the reverse.


Description:
Cosmetic dish, the lower portion of this dish is mostly broken away. The upper ornamented part show a rather poor carving of a male and female couple with two attendants.

Other:
There is a roughly incised lotus on the reverse, the whole being a very inferior piece of workmanship.


Description:
Cosmetic dish with a normal three compartment type, and has in its upper section a very common motif of a couple with derinking cups;

Other:
There is a large schematic lotus design on the reverse.


Description:
Cosmetic dish divided into six radial compartments surrounding a central circular recess.

Other:
The compartments are carved with flowers and one with a bird, probably a crow.


Description:
Cosmetic dish divided into three compartments by the nornal T-shaped ridges. The upper section shows a man and woman carved in relief. A lotus pattern fills the two lower compartments.

Other:
On the reverse the artist has started to sketch in the design of a lotus.


Description:
Ornamented in its upper portion with a figure siding a sea monster.

Other:
The lower dish portion is well under half the full are of the object. The reverse is plain.


Description:
Cosmetic dish, a somewhat unusual type, divided into five compartments, four of which prolong the sides of the central one and have parallel sided petal decoration,

Other:
The central portion being filled with a carving of the head shoulders of a man and woman, which show no great artistic merit.


Description:
Cosmetic dish with upper compartment shwing two rather crdudely depicted seated figures.

Other:
The one in the central position seated on a stool appears to be male and the other to the right might be either male or female. In the lower compartmnet there is a very roughly indicated lotus pattern; the reverse is plain.


Description:
Cosmetic dish in miniature and is divided by T-shaped ridges.

Other:
The upper part is carved with a seated figure, so crudely rendered that any details are quitre obscure. There is a roughly and lightly incised lotus on the reverse.


Description:
Cosmetic dish, divided into three compartments by T-shaped ridges.

Other:
this dish is ornamented with a crouching lion in The upper compartment. The reverse is plain.


Description:
Cosmetic dish with a central fragment of a 'T' divided sish, with a lion attacking a brahmani bull in the upper portion.


Description:
Cosmetic Tray with “The Death of Adonis"

Other:
In this relief carving, three satyrs mourn the

youthful Adonis, who reclines upon the boar that

has slain him. The naturalistic rendering of these

figures and their mythological subject matter

points to Mediterranean sources. Possibly Kushan


Description:
Palette with Sea Nymph (Nereid) Riding on a Sea Monster


Description:
The palette depicts an image of Scythian (Śaka) king (?). The size of the object and the depicted figures make it very unusual.

Other:
The upper part of the tray depicts a sitting male figure wearing a Scytho-Parthian dress. His cross-legged position reminds us of the images of Scythian (Śaka) kings on their coins. Two men on both sides are probably servants. In the beginning of the 1st century in the period of King Azes´reign, there was an advanced production of these palettes. Courtly life as depicted in the presented palette is rare. The most common were antique, mythological or hunting themes.


Description:
Indo-Greek stone palette with Poseidon/Neptune


Description:
Indo-Parthian stone pallet with king and attendants.


Description:
Fire alter worship. Possible Zoroastrian cult.


Description:
Stone palette showing a Dionysiac assembly


Description:
Nereid mounting a ketos, greeted by Cupid


Description:
Aphrodite and Eros (Or Herakles and Omphale according to Dar, 1979)


Description:
Europa being carried over by Zeus as a bull


Description:
Toilet-tray with the representation of a drinking couple


Museum Location:
Italian Archaeological Mission in Pakistan

Description:
Stone palette with a single turbaned male figure


Description:
Stone palette with floral patterns and four figures


Image:
ter Tanabe 2007, 230#http://ter Tanabe 2007, 230#


Description:
A circular palette or cosmetic dish with an everted rim.

Other:
The central portion is divided into two parts, the larger of the two being carved in relief with a scene of an apparently drunken nude figure supported by two robed companions, that on the left carrying a bowl.

Citation(s):
Barker and Wright, 1938, Bushthal, 1945, Francfort, 1979


Description:
This carved plaque shows Apollo grasping Daphne by the rist as she sinks onto a pile of rocks.

Other:
At the right edge of the pile a naked youth is sitting cross-legged, his left hand raised palm out towards a woman, possibly holding her dress.


Description:
Cosmetic dish, the upper half showing in relief the figure of a makara, a dragon with wings and a fish's tail, having its front paws in a sphinx-like attitude.


Description:
Cosmetic dish with the upper part showing a woman in a sitting posture with two boys, one of whom holds a cup or perhaps a lotus bloom.

Other:
The smaller receptacle portion is broken away. There is a simple decoration of incised concentric circles on the reverse.


Description:
Circular stone dish with a damaged rim. The central part is divided into two parts, with a horizontal divider separating them.

Other:
The lower part has more sketchily carved petal decoration carved with crudely incised lines radiating from a featureless lump of stone in the middle.


Description:
Cosmetic dish with the upper decorated portion of the sih shwoing a winged creature with a long serpentine neck.


Description:
A man disrobing a woman (Apollo and Daphne)?


Other:
Dar (1979) claims it was sent to Delhi, but this is not certain


Other:
Dar (1979) claims it is there, but it is not certain


Description:
A couple with their arms around each other


Description:
A fully clad woman and a makara-like monster


Description:
A Lion is seen in one of the tray's nine compartments


Description:
A fragment depicting a hippocampus and five pairs of people (?)


Description:
Draped woman riding a sea-monster sideways


Description:
Lion in the central of the nine-compartments


Description:
Winged stag, lion and goat, with a winged man riding the stag


Description:
Makara-like monster in one compartment, serpent-legged person on the other


Description:
A man reclining on a bed, kissing a woman


Description:
Fragment. Hind quarter of a Makara-like monster


Description:
Surya and Savitri driven by a two-horse chariot


Description:
Two males, standing, one male sitting and a ram and an altar


Description:
A man, a woman and an Eros next to an altar


Description:
Seven figures in 'Dionysiac' composition


Description:
Erotic Couple. Woman approaching the man


Description:
Two female figures flanked by two dancers


Description:
Fragment. Half-nude Aphrodite beating an Eros


Description:
Damaged. Two birds facing and holding a necklace


