Glass jug (olpe)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent pale yellow; handle in uncertain color. Collared rim with upward flaring lip and solid horizontal roll on underside; broad, concave neck, expanding downwards to sloping shoulder; convex side to body, tapering downwards; pushed-in bottom; strap handle with two projecting ribs and downward fins, applied as a broad pad to shoulder, drawn up and out, then curved round and in, with hollow roll above rim, and trailed onto outer edge of rim and down to top of neck. Intact; many pinprick and some larger bubbles; heavily pitted and weathered with brilliant iridescence and patches of thick creamy brown weathering.

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