Terracotta jug with a pitcher-spout

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This jug is a variation on a type of Cypriot vessel that has a figurine holding the oinochoe, which serves as its spout. Despite the absence of such a figure, which when present often helps to date jugs of this kind, the overall form of the pitcher identifies it as a product of the Hellenistic period. The wreaths and fillets painted on the white-slip ground are funerary motifs often seen on white ground lekythoi, vases specifically used as grave gifts. Of particular interest are the small clay "rivets" visible at the top of the back handle, which relates this clay jug to a metal prototype.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.

Metropolitan Museum of Art