Glass mosaic inlay

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent blue ground; decoration in opaque white, yellow, and red, and translucent purple, appearing black. Polygonal, flat, and very thin plaque. Symmetrical ivy leaf and palmette motif arranged on a square frame around a central compressed design, with a palmette with spiral volutes below on sides of square and ivy leaves in solid white at corners. Broken across middle with almost half of motif missing; upper and underside and edge ground and polished; pitted surface bubbles. The inlay is made from two sections cut from the same cane of mosaic glass, with decoration appearing in mirror image. Fragment of blue hexagon, backed on double thickness of colorless; many colored flowers.

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