This is the standard table ware of the early-mid Hellenistic period in the northernmost Levant. Vessel fabric is a clean light pinkish brown; they are partially or mostly covered in a shiny slip, usually fired to orange-red, but it can be also be matte brown or red, semi lustrous or slightly metallic red, dark purple, or black.
It is most common in the region of coastal Cilicia, from Hama to Kinet Höyük/Issus to Tarsus (Jones 1950), in the third century BCE; its ubiquity here suggests this as a likely zone of origin. Potters in this region had access to a particularly excellent source of potting clay, which is classified on the LCP as
Early and Middle Hellenistic Cilician Hellenistic Slipped Fine Ware vessels from Kinet Höyük, Turkey (photo by Lesley Boggs)
Early and Middle Hellenistic Cilician Hellenistic Slipped Fine Ware vessels from Kinet Höyük, Turkey (photo by Lesley Boggs))
Early and Middle Hellenistic Cilician Hellenistic Slipped Fine Ware vessels from Antioch-Daphne (courtesy Princeton Museum of Art and Archaeology)
Middle Hellenistic Cilician Hellenistic slipped fine ware plates and saucers from Kinet Höyük, Turkey (photo by Peter Stone)
Moderately hard and dense, clean light pinkish brown (5YR 7/4–7.5YR 8/4), with occasional voids and a few fine lime inclusions, fully fired light pink brown or orange pink throughout most of section. Matte to semi-lustrous smooth orange-red slip, very similar in color to ESA but generally brushed on rather than dipped, often wet-smoothed, usually covering the entire vessel interior but only the upper exterior, dribbling onto lower wall.
Slip color and quality is variable &nda...
'Akko, Harbor (Israel/Northern Coastal Plain)
Horbat Zefat 'Adi (Israel/Northern Coastal Plain)