Glass rectangular bottle

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent deep blue green; handles in same color. Partially tubular rim folded out, down, round and in, with flattened upper surface; cylindricalm convex neck, with horizontal tooling marks around the base; horizontal shoulder with large rounded corners; rectangular body with flat sides, tapering downward; thick, concave bottom, pushed in off-center; two broad handles, each with three ribs, applied as a long pad to short edge of shoulder, drawn up vertically, then bent in and down, and attached to neck and underside of rim with upward trail. On bottom, diamond in relief, enclosing a staff with V-shaped finials at both ends, flanked in middle by two relief squares, each containing a hollow circle, perhaps representing a standard or banner. Intact, except for almost one third of the rim and top of the neck; pinprick and larger elongated bubbles; surface scratches, some soil encrustation around tops of handles, and faint iridescence. Greenish blue, two handled vase.

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