Terracotta calyx-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water)

Spreckles Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, Kadmos and the snake Reverse, man between two women Kadmos, son of Agenor king of Tyre, was told by the oracle at Delphi to follow a cow until she lay down and to found a city there. The place was Thebes. In order to sacrifice the cow to Athena, Kadmos needed water. The nearest spring was guarded by a serpent, son of Ares. The representation here shows Athena seconding Kadmos, who raises his hydria (water jar) against the serpent. Ares stands at the far right. The seated woman is probably the nymph associated with the spring or a personification of Thebes. Kadmos kills the monster, and sowing its teeth in the ground, he produces the inhabitants of the new city.

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