Ribbed glass bowl

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent pale blue green. Vertical rim with beveled top edge; plain band around top of sides, tapering downwards, then bulging outward before curving in sharply to almost flat bottom. On interior, two concentric grooves around bottom and small, broader circle at center; on exterior, eighty-eight well-defined, short slanting ribs of slightly varying length and width, with tops ground off, arranged around bulging middle section of body. Broken and repaired, with one section of rim miising and some smaller chips elsewhere in rim; some pinprick and a few larger bubbles; pitting, dulling, and iridescent weathering. Rotary grinding marks on plain band around top of sides and on interior.

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