I started this jug with two faces sharing one eye. The one face looked sort of regal so I decided they would be two kings and would represent "dualities" (good and bad, love and hate, heaven and hell etc.) I loooked for instances of dual monarchies and came across the story of the two kings of Sparta. Sparta was unusual in that it had two kings simultaneously, coming from two separate lines. According to tradition, the two lines, the Agiads and Eurypontids, were respectively descended from the descendants of Heracles who supposedly conquered Sparta two generations after the Trojan War. Finding this information gave me a title and basis for the jug. I made a crown and thought It needed a stopper so I fashioned an owl from a thrown shape that I had lying around. The owl was a symbol of Athena.
Athena was the goddess defender of towns and cities, and the patron goddess of crafts such as weaving, pottery and sculpture. Her most important shrine was the Bronze House gracing the height of the Acropolis at Sparta. I glazed the crown and owl with a bronze glaze to go along with the story.
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