Glass mosaic ribbed bowl fragment

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Rim fragment. Translucent deep honey brown, cobalt blue, and opaque white. Outsplayed rim with rounded lip; slightly convex curving side tapering downward. Spiral mosaic pattern formed from lengths of one or more canes in a brown ground with bands of fine blue and white threads in parallel lines; on exterior, part of a broad vertical rib, with flattened and tooling indents at sides. Polished interior; pitting and weathering of surface bubbles; dulling and creamy iridescent weathering on exterior, lip of rim, and jagged 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