BOULDER, COLO.- A small bottle in the form of the goddess Tyche, an unusually well-preserved Hellenistic drinking cup and a jewel-like Roman “basket jar” are among the ancient glass works taking center stage in Artemis Fine Arts and Arte Primitivo’s September 16 auction, a sale that offers collectors an unusually broad look at how glassmaking changed across the Mediterranean world over nearly a millennium.

The sale is the second half of a two-day collaboration between Artemis Fine Arts and Arte Primitivo. Following a September 15 session devoted to Pre-Columbian, Native American material and fossils, the September 16 auction turns to Egyptian, Greek, Roman and Near Eastern antiquities alongside African, tribal and Asian art.

Within that larger sale, the ancient glass section forms an almost self-contained history of the medium, beginning with vessels painstakingly shaped around removable cores centuries before the invention of glassblowing and moving through Hellenistic cast glass to the extraordinary freedom Roman craftsmen achieved with the blowpipe.

Among the most important objects is Lot 430, an important Hellenistic glass skyphos, dated about 250–150 BCE and estimated at $20,000–$25,000. Rather than being blown, the pale olive-green vessel was cast and cut, with a deep conical bowl, splayed foot and two elaborate ring handles equipped with thumb rests. Remarkably, the auction house describes it as intact and in excellent condition apart from a minute nick beneath one handle.

Its survival becomes more striking when compared with museum examples. The Metropolitan Museum of Art owns a closely related late third- to early second-century BCE skyphos with the same general type of carved ring handles and thumb rests, although the museum vessel has been broken and repaired. The Artemis catalogue cites the Met example as a comparison.

The cup belongs to a period when Hellenistic glassmakers were using labor-intensive casting and grinding techniques to create vessels that could evoke the appearance of luxury rock crystal. Rotary grinding marks remain visible on the auction example, preserving physical evidence of the manufacturing process.


Roman Opaque White Glass Flask | Tyche Enthroned, Eros. Estimate: $20,000 - $25,000

Sharing the top estimate is Lot 429, a Roman opaque white glass flask depicting Tyche enthroned with Eros, dating from about the second to third century CE and carrying an estimate of $20,000–$25,000. Here the container itself becomes sculpture. Tyche, the protective goddess associated with a city's fortune, sits frontally in draped clothing, while the vessel's neck rises from her head. A small winged Eros accompanies her.

The composition ultimately looks back to the celebrated Tyche of Antioch created by Eutychides of Sikyon in the Hellenistic period. The unusual opaque white glass makes the Artemis example especially striking among surviving Roman figural vessels.

Another standout is Lot 427, a Roman purple glass basket jar with green handles, dating to about 200–400 CE and estimated at $8,000–$12,000. Its low globular body is deep purple, turning garnet as light passes through it, while pale green loop handles surround the mouth like the rim of a woven basket. Applied glass trails rise from the base toward the neck, adding another layer of decoration.

That vessel belongs to the world created by one of antiquity's great technological revolutions. The spread of glassblowing around the first century BCE radically accelerated production. Instead of laboriously forming every vessel around a core or grinding it from a cast blank, craftsmen could inflate molten glass and manipulate it while hot, adding handles, trails and other decorative elements.


Important Roman Glass Winged-Handle Cup, 1st Century CE.

Lot 426, an important Roman winged-handle glass cup from the 1st century CE, demonstrates just how inventive that vocabulary could become. Estimated at $8,000–$12,000, the pale olive-green drinking vessel has two broad horizontal handles ending in pointed projections, forms that evoke the sharply articulated handles of contemporary metal tableware.

Nearby, Lot 425, a large Roman glass modiolus cup, dates to the first century CE and carries a $2,250–$3,500 estimate. Its bucket-like form takes its name from the Roman dry measure it resembles. The vessel offers another glimpse into Roman drinking culture and the remarkable range of shapes glassworkers were able to produce.

The sale also looks backward to techniques that preceded glassblowing. Lot 421, a Phoenician core-formed glass alabastron with zigzag trails, dated roughly 500–200 BCE, combines a rich cobalt ground with yellow and pale blue decoration. The vessel carries an estimate of $3,000–$5,000.

To make such a container, craftsmen formed a temporary core around a rod, applied molten glass around it and then added colored trails, which could be combed into zigzags and feather-like patterns. After cooling, the core was removed through the vessel's narrow mouth. These small containers were commonly associated with precious oils, perfumes and cosmetics.


Intact Hellenistic Core-Formed Glass Amphoriskos. Estimate: $5,000 - $7,500

An intact Hellenistic core-formed glass amphoriskos, Lot 423, estimated at $5,000–$7,500, provides an especially appealing survival of that older tradition. Dating to roughly 200–50 BCE, its cobalt body is decorated with yellow, white and pale blue trails and complemented by translucent blue handles. The auction house reports the vessel intact, without breaks or restoration.

Color provides another thread running through the group. Lot 412, a Roman cobalt-blue glass bottle with spiral thread decoration, dates to around the first century CE and uses a long slender neck and applied cobalt glass to turn a small perfume container into a highly graphic object. Estimated at $1,000–$1,500, the bottle is described as intact.

A related play of contrasting color appears in Lot 418, a Roman fluted glass amphoriskos with blue handles. Estimated at $1,200–$1,500, the vessel demonstrates how even relatively small Roman containers could combine blown form, patterned surfaces and applied handles to striking decorative effect.

The functional diversity of Roman glass is represented by Lot 419, a Roman glass guttus flask with a projecting spout, estimated at $900–$1,300. The form was designed to dispense its contents in a controlled stream, showing how Roman glassworkers adapted the material to specialized everyday uses.


Roman Imperial Glass Bead Strand, Sky Blue. Estimate: $1,500 - $2,000.

Adornment also appears in the section. Lot 409, a strand of Roman Imperial sky-blue glass beads, dates to about the first and second centuries CE. The ancient beads have been restrung as a wearable necklace and carry a $1,500–$2,000 estimate. Their surviving iridescence is the product of centuries of interaction between the glass surface and its burial environment.

The chronological sequence continues into Late Antiquity with Lot 428, a Late Roman or Byzantine glass chalice with millefiori decoration. Dating to roughly 400–700 CE and estimated at $1,800–$2,500, the honey-colored vessel incorporates blue millefiori elements around its bowl.

Taken together, the group offers more than a succession of attractive vessels. The objects preserve evidence of experimentation: the laborious core-built perfume containers of the Phoenician and Hellenistic worlds; cast and polished tableware intended to rival precious stone; the thin walls and exuberant applied ornament made possible by blowing; and Roman vessels in which mythology, utility and decoration could converge in a single object.

The result is a compact history of ancient glass in which technology, trade, religion and ordinary life remain visible in the same fragile material. More than two thousand years after many of these vessels were made to hold wine, oil, cosmetics or perfume, their original contents have vanished. What survives is the ingenuity of the people who learned to turn sand, minerals and fire into objects that still transmit light.

The Artemis Fine Arts and Arte Primitivo Day 2: Antiquities, Tribal, African, Asian auction will take place September 16, 2026, beginning at 11 a.m. EDT in Louisville, Colorado.