Terracotta oinochoe: chous (jug)

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Man with lyre and staff, woman with lamp, on opposite sides of door The subject concerns an Athenian reveler at the end of a bibulous evening. There has been considerable debate as to whether the man is returning home or calling on a hetaira (prostitute). Of exceptional architectural interest is the abbreviated depiction of the front of a house with the solid door and the tiled roof.

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