Context (Field collection)
Catalogue card notes: ‘collected by Colonel Benn early in the present [20th] century in S. Baluchistan about 100-200 miles south of Kelat. It came from grass covered mounds.’ Although no findspot was given when the collection arrived in 1951, the British Museum also has a similar group of material collected by Colonel Benn and donated by him in 1913 (BM 1913,0308) which they list as from Nal [Naal]. It may then be that MAA’s collection is from the same site, and this has been tentatively added to the Place field. Colonel Benn was a political agent in Chagai, Balochistan from 1906-1912, which is likely when both the MAA and British Museum objects were collected.
Event Date 1906
Author: Imogen Gunn (admin)

Context (Acquisition Details)
Given by Colonel Robert A.E. Benn to his cousin, Charles Anthony Benn, whose widow, Leila Alice Russell Benn, presented it to the museum. 
Event Date 1951
Author: Lizzy Peneycad

Context (Analysis)
Described by the donor, Leila Alice Russell Benn, as ‘Mekrani pottery’. 
Event Date 1951
Author: Lizzy Peneycad

Description (Physical description)
Catalogue card for 1951.537 A-D: 'Four 'canister'-shaped buff ware, wheel-made vessels of a type peculiarly distinctive of the Nal Culture. D: Large canister jar. Rim painted in zig-zag. Sides in three alternating patterns of leaf design and equal armed crosses. This has originally had red and yellow paint as well as black outlined but has faded.'
Event Date 1951
Author: maa

Context (Display)
Exhibited: on display in the Clarke Gallery, case 63, from 1984 until 01/03/2010.
Event Date 1984
Author: Lizzy Peneycad

Description (Physical description)
Large canister of wheel-made, buff coloured Nal ware, with cream slip and monochrome painted decoration in black. Originally polychrome, with red and yellow paint. Decoration on body: two panels with a branch and leaves filled with diagonal lines; two panels with equal-armed, multi-outlined crosses surrounding a central circle. Decoration on top: double-outlined zigzags. Vessel has: a flat, circular base; slightly flared walls; ledge around the top with a protruding edge; narrowed circular opening with small upright rim.
Event Date 26/9/2023
Author: Lizzy Peneycad