Beak spout ca. 7th century B.C. Iran This beak spout was originally part of a ceramic pitcher made of red clay. Both the end of the beak and the neck that attached to the vessel are broken off. A curl sits on top of the beak at the back.This object was excavated at Tepe Nush-i Jan, an Iron Age hilltop site about 60 km sound of Hamadan in western Iran. Nush-i Jan was occupied in the 7th and 6th centuries B.C., and its occupants are generally thought to be the Medes, an Iranian people known from Assyrian, Achaemenid and Biblical sources. Though the textual sources portray them as a powerful empire, archaeological evidence for the Medes has yet to sustain this impression. Rather, they seem to have lived in scattered fortified sites in western and central Iran, without any clear capital. Nush-i Jan, one of the best known of these sites, features two temples, a columned hall, and a fort. This spout was discovered in the East Court,’ an open area next to the fort.Spouted pitchers are a well