Glass amphoriskos (perfume bottle)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent cobalt blue, with handles and base-knob in same color; trails in opaque yellow and opaque white. Broad horizontal rim-disk with rounded edge; cylindrical neck, expanding slightly downwards; broad, sloping shoulder; elongated ovoid body, tapering sharply downwards; applied small circular base-knob with uneven bottom; two strap handles applied to shoulder and drawn up, turned in, and pressed on to neck. One fine white trail attached at edge of rim-disk; a yellow trail applied to top of body and wound spirally, at first in a horizontal line, then tooled into a feather pattern, with alternating upward and downward strokes, the former making slightly raised knobs, the latter shallow indents around top of body; a second trail in white added around upper body, forming alternating bands with the yellow trail; both trails continuing to bottom; on base-knob, three stratified eyes, comprising an outer circle and central dot in translucent blue and broader inner circle in opaque white. Broken and repaired around body, and one quarter of rim-disk missing; some dulling and patches of creamy iridescent weathering.

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