Glass jug

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent light yellow green; handle and trail in same color. Everted rim with thick, rounded lip; short, flaring mouth; tall, elongated piriform body; outsplayed, tubular foot ring, made by folding; concave bottom with central kick and pontil scar; broad rod handle attached to upper body, with tail extending down side, drawn up in a arched curve and applied to trail around top of body, and trailed off back along itself. A thick trail wound one and a half times horizontally around top of body; the tail to the handle is decorated with seven tooled notches. Intact; pinprick and a few larger bubbles; dulling, limy encrustation, weathering, and iridescence on exterior, most of interior covered with soil encrustation. Greenish, on low foot with elaborate attachment below handle and thread around neck.

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