Terracotta oil lamp

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Vessberg type 19 (slipper lamp). Mold-made, with applied conical handle. Broad, sharply carinated body; on the discus, indistinct pattern with central filling hole, surrounded by two raised lines that run forward to the wick hole, forming a channel between the two; on the shoulder, a pattern of wavy tendrils. Undefined base, with raised line extending to front. Intact, but heavily encrusted. The wick hole has been crudely formed in the center of the discus.

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