Glass plate with head of Medusa

Glass plate with head of Medusa

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent pale blue green. Rounded, upturned, and outsplayed rim, curving in below to flat body; integral low base ring with rounded edge. On underside of body, circular pattern of thirty-five outward-pointing incised tongues, outlined with incised lines, within a raised border around base ring; with base ring, an incised circle surrounds an engraved head of Medusa with flowing locks and wings, facing frontally but looking slightly to the left. Intact, except for large chip in base ring; tiny pinprick bubbles; dulling, patches of pitting with brown weathering on upper surface of body, iridescence and faint whitish weathering on underside. This small glass plate was published in 1997 as a 19th-century forgery, but a more recent study has concluded that both the object and the cut decoration are Roman. Although this vessel is said to have come from Rome, its closest parallels are known from sites such as Trier and Xanten in the Rhineland. In later Roman times, some cast glass was produced in preference to blown glass, as with this example, allowing for a thicker vessel wall and deeper cutting of the decoration.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Glass plate with head of MedusaGlass plate with head of MedusaGlass plate with head of MedusaGlass plate with head of MedusaGlass plate with head of Medusa

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.