Glass double-bodied bottle with handle

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent blue green; handle in same color. Everted tubular rims, folded over and in; cylindrical necks, expanding downwards; globular bodies, pressed together, forming flat inner wall; thick, slightly concave bottom, with central pontil mark; thick rod handle, applied as a large pad to base of neck over join of bodies, drawn up in a curving loop, and trailed onto top of necks and over upper lip of rims. Cracked and broken with three large holes in one body; few bubbles; dulling, some limy encrustation, brownish weathering, and iridescence. The bottle was made by joining vertically two separately blown vessels. Parallels are rare but are known from both the western and eastern halves of the Roman Empire. It is uncertain what liquids it contained but traditionally it is known as an "oil and vinegar" bottle.

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