Around the shoulder in a cursive hand:

‘Glory and prosperity and wealth and well-being and happiness and health to its owner’

Around the rim, in Kufic:

‘With good-fortune and blessing and happiness and well-being and wealth and honour’

This vessel, attributed to the region of Khurasan, is characteristic of a large group of twelth-century buckets which were derived from the Etruscan situla (Roman for 'bucket'). Whilst the Etruscan original was a simple straight-sided, flat bottomed vessel, its Islamic counterpart became imbued with a more ornate Persian composition, developing a rounded body, flaring foot and decorative friezes. Usually decorated with successive bands of alternating inscriptions and figural scenes, these pieces are engraved with silver and copper. The so-called Bobrinsky bucket, now in The State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, is probably the best-known example (alongside the later Fould bucket, also in the same museum). It bears the date 599 AH/1163 AD and was made in Herat (published in Ward 1993, no.54). A very similar piece, with also three engraved registers including a central one with the zodiacal signs has been attributed to the twelfth century, now in the British Museum, London, inv. no.1958,1013.1. A bucket from the same group, also with medallions containing the signs of the zodiac was sold at Bonhams London, 6 October 2008, lot 174. Another example, with zodiac signs and copper inlay, was offered at Christie’s London, 25 October 2018, lot 35. The lower band with running animals is very close to a band on a tray attributed to the thirteenth century, now in the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, inv. no.M.31-1954; published in Melikian-Chirvani 1982, p.97, no.27.