Campanian lekythos
Creators: name: Museum, Centre for Ancient Cultures
Publisher: name: Monash University
Year: 2022
Subjects: Archaeology of Europe, the Mediterranean and the Levant
Heritage, archive and museum studies not elsewhere classified
Archaeology not elsewhere classified
Ceramics
Classical Greek and Roman history
Other history, heritage and archaeology not elsewhere classified

description: <br> South Italian (region of Campania) small black figured pottery lekythos, used to contain perfumed oil often associated with funerary rites. The design is black on red ground with incised lines and white (face, hand and feet) and yellow (facial features, coiffure, mirror) accessories. It has a pear-shaped body that narrows to a cylindrical neck and flares to a flat rim; neck and shoulder are not marked off. A strap handle joins neck to shoulder, all upon a discoid foot. The main decorative field features a seated woman wearing a chiton (tunic) and himation (wrap) with earrings and her hair collected possibly with a sakkos, facing right and holding a mirror in her right hand. At the back are palmette and tendrils. A black band with red squares decorates the neck and an ivy-leaf with buds lies on either side. Stylistic remarks: attributed to the Pagenstecher Class. The distinctive shape is typical of Paestum, Campania and Sicily. Quite small in scale, they were usually decorated with one single figure an animal or a head. Object number: 127.073. Date: 340–325 BCE Parallels: very similar examples especially in the vegetal decoration Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts 99.2.A; London, British Museum 1772,0320.35, 1772,0320.174, 1931,0414.1, 1978,0414.10, 1978,0414.11; compare with Reading, Ure Museum of Greek Archaeology 51.7.14, 60.1.1; Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum 78.AE.308; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 06.1021.223, 41.162.235; Cleveland, Cleveland Museum of Art 1985.1. References: Walters, H B., Forsdyke, E J., Smith, C. H., <em>Catalogue of Vases in the British Museum</em>, London: BMP, 1893-1925 (F516); Schneider-Herrmann, G., "A Pagenstecher Lekythos in Utrecht, Origin and Related Examples.", in J.M. Hemelrijk. Drukker, A.A. et al, (eds), <em>Enthousiasmos: essays on Greek and related pottery</em>, Amsterdam: Allard Pierson Museum, 1986), pp. 174-75, ill. Fig. 12a-c.; Trendall, A. D., <em>The red-figured vases of Paestum</em>, London: British School at Rome, 1987, p. 387; on the Pagenstecher Class see Hurschmann, R., "Die Pagenstecher-Lekythen", <em>Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 103</em>, 1988; Spigo, U., “Nuovi rinvenimenti di ceramica a figure rosse di fabbrica siceliota ed italiota da Lipari e dalla provincia di Messina”, <em>Mediterranean Archaeology</em>, vol. 5/6, 1992, pp. 32–47; Hurschmann, R., <em>Die Pagenstecher-Lekythoi</em>, Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1997; Turner, M., “Aphrodite and Her Birds: The Iconology of Pagenstecher Lekythoi”, <em>Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies </em>48.1, 2005, pp. 57-96; Mertens, J. R., "Some Notes on the Metropolitan's Pagenstecher Lekythos", in Robert B. Koehl (ed.) <em>Amilla: The Quest for Excellence. Studies Presented to Guenter Kopcke in Celebration of his 75th Birthday</em>, Philadelphia: INSTAP, 2013, pp. 415-421.Photo by Steve Morton