Terracotta bail-amphora (jar)

Ixion Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, Bellerophon and the chimaera Reverse, two youths The Ixion Painter was the foremost Campanian artist of the later fourth century, and the bail-amphora was favored in that region. The painter exploited the awkward, narrow verticality to depict Pegasos and Bellerophon airborne above the wounded chimaera. This mythical creature had a lion's body, a goat's forepart on its back, and a snake's tail.

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