Terracotta calyx-krater (mixing bowl)

Dolon Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, scene from a phlyax play. Reverse, three youths The representation shows a stage structure at the far right and the characters of a phlyax play, a type of farce favored in Southern Italy. A recent interpretation characterizes the two male figures in the center as accomplices about to steal the hag's goose and kid or to defy her threats to turn them in. Written in Attic Greek, the inscriptions indicate that the farce originated in mainland Greece but do not explain the story. Formerly attributed to the Tarporley Painter, a major Apulian master, the vase is now recognized as Lucanian under Apulian influence.

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