Stone and clay may dominate archaeological narratives of Ancient Western Asian museum galleries, shaping our understanding through what has survived best. Yet, ancient craftspeople worked within a far richer material world that included glass, glazes, pigments, faience, and one of history’s earliest synthetic materials: Egyptian blue or zagindurû in Akkadian. Drawing on the Ancient Western Asian seal collection at the Morgan Library & Museum made famous by the glyptic scholarship of Edith Porada, this lecture explores how seals can open a window into broader questions of material performance and innovation. Rather than viewing stone as the pinnacle medium in traditional hierarchies of value, it argues for a more expansive perspective on seal materials that recognizes experimentation, technical knowledge, and creativity.

Dr. Pınar Durgun is an art-historically trained archaeologist with a strong background in anthropology. She has a Ph.D. from Brown University’s Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World. Dr. Durgun has worked as a researcher, educator, and curator at various museums including the Pergamon Museum’s Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Her research focuses on death and burial practices, copies and copying, images and identity making, materials and makers in the ancient world.