Terracotta lekythos (oil flask)

Attributed to the Cock Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Lekythoi filled with oil were offerings to the dead. The scene on this lekythos, a warrior departing for battle, is likely a family gathering of the warrior’s father, wife, and son. Such representations, which show the warrior in the company of a small group of family members, reflect similar representations on Greek funerary monuments.

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