Glass mosaic fragment

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Translucent purple and blue, opaque white and yellow, and colorless. Part of flat bottom and convex curving side expanding upward. Mosaic pattern formed from sections of two or more canes: one in a purple ground with white dots around a blue center outlined in white, and another in parallel bands of yellow, partially mixed with colorless, and blue and white stripes. Polished exterior; pitting of surface bubbles and joins between canes; dulling, pitting, and slight iridescent weathering on interior and edges.

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