Glass double head-shaped flask

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent colorless with greenish tinge, with handle of indeterminate color. Unworked, uneven, and everted rim, with slight bulge below; funnel neck; body in the shape of a double head; oval base with flat bottom and rounded, slightly bulging edge; handle wound round neck anticlockwise to form thick, round coil, drawn out horizontally, turned in and down, and then attached to side of body. On body, two heads, back to back, with similar but not identical features (one smiling, one serious ?): hair rendered as three rows of evenly-spaced knobs framing the faces to below chin level, arched brows, prominent bridge to nose, small mouth with parted lips, chubby cheeks, and rounded chin; on handle, three tooled crimps projecting outwards. Two large holes in sides of body; some bubbles and blowing striations; dulling, pitting, iridescence, and patches of thick creamy weathering, and some soil encrustation on interior.

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