Roman Judaea, ca. 1st century AD. Unfinished Limestone Mug. In antiquity, stone vessels were primarily been used for grinding and pounding, and were carved from hard limestone or basalt. Vessels fashioned from white and bituminous chalk, a soft limestone, first appear during the Second Temple Period. Their creation seems to coincide with an increased strictness in the observance of the laws of purity and defilement in the Halakah, the entire body of Jewish law and tradition, including the laws of the Bible and the oral law as transcribed in the legal section of the Talmud. The core of this unfinished exemplar was never fully hollowed out. Height: 5½".
Cf. Purity Broke Out in Israel: Stone Vessels in the Late Second Temple Period (University of Haifa, 1994), plates I-II. Estimate Value $250 - 300
Ex Living Torah Museum collection.