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Attic black-figured olpe from Tomb 720 (Photograph from the Metropolitan Museum of Art) -
Attic black-figured olpe from Tomb 720 (Photograph from the Metropolitan Museum of Art) -
Butler photo: Attic Black Figure Olpe (Howard Crosby Butler Archive, Department of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University) -
Pottery from Tomb 720. L to R: trefoil oinochoe P1294; skyphos with knobs P1286; squat pitcher P1296; stemmed dish MMA 14.30.14; flask P1299; small jug with four projections P1295; skyphos krater P1282; aryballos P1297; Attic black-figure olpe MMA 26.164.28 (Howard Crosby Butler Archive, Department of Art and Archaeology, Princeton University)
Attic Black Figure Olpe
- Date
- Ca. 560-540 BC, Lydian
- Sardis or Museum Inv. No.
- MMA 26.164.28
- Material
- Ceramic
- Object Type
- Pottery
- Pottery Shape
- Olpe
- Pottery Ware
- Attic Black Figure
- Pottery Attribution
- Site
- Sardis
- Sector
- Nec
- Trench
- Butler Tomb 720
- Locus
- Butler Tomb 720
- Findspot
- Necropolis, Tomb 720. Found in the same grave as the Lakonian kylix (
Lak App. 1 ) and the "Skyphos of Klitomenes" (Att App. 15 ).
- Description
Restored from many fragments; complete except for small pieces of the rim and body. Two panthers, walking on a ground line are confronted at either side of a stylized lotus flower. Their heads face front. The tail of each curls up and "disappears" behind the horizontal band above the animals, but reappears as it curls over the back. Blobs of paint, placed around the panthers, serve as filling ornament. The trefoil mouth is painted black, as is the border of Zs and the narrow horizontal band below, and the lower body and foot. A streaky, weak black glaze has been used, with reddish-brown overpaint on the panthers’ necks, ribs, and one haunch.
A “straggler, continuing the tradition of the Early Olpe Group, but later and not belonging to it” (Beazley in ABV 15).
- Dimensions
- H. to top of handle 0.172; H. to top of lip 0.138; W. of handle 0.017; max. diam. 0.086.
- Comments
- Cf. Beazley, “Early BF,” 42, n. 8; ABV 15.1; Shefton, “Laconian Vase-Painters,” 310, n. 15; G.M.A. Richter, Greek Collection, 40, n. 76, pl. 266; idem, Archaic Greek Art (New York 1949) 53 (where the acquisition number is incorrectly given as 26.164.128); Andrew Oliver, Jr., “The Arts of Turkey: Lydia,” BMMA 26:5 (1968) 199, no. 8; B.K. McLauchlin, “The Necropolis,” Sardis Guides 5 (1983) pl. 4, lower left. On early Attic olpai, J.D. Beazley, H. Payne, “Attic Black-Figured Fragments from naukratis,” JHS 49 (1929) 253-54.
- See Also
- Bibliography
- Published: Sardis I, 119, fig. 125. See also the Metropolitan Museum web site.
- Author
- NHR