Obverse, Dionysos banqueting Reverse, three youths
The scene presents an early form of the outdoor gathering—with or without repast—so favored in later Western art. Dionysos, the god of wine, reclines on a couch in a hilly setting with a spreading vine. A young man and an old satyr attend to the wine—worthy of notice is their calyx-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water) decorated with a satyr and maenad, followers of Dionysos. In front of the god is a surface with bread and fruit. The woman at right brings grapes in a flat basket. Although the drawing is facile, the figures are substantial and individually characterized.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Terracotta pelike (jar)
Artist:Attributed to the Somzée Painter
Period:Classical
Date:ca. 420–410 BCE
Culture:Greek, Attic
Medium:Terracotta; red-figure
Dimensions:H.: 14 1/2 x 11 1/16 in. (36.8 x 28.1 cm)
Classification:Vases
Credit Line:Gift of Samuel G. Ward, 1875
Accession Number:75.2.7
Said to be from the vicinity of Athens
Before 1873, excavated in the vicinity of Athens; briefly, with Professor Athanasios Sergiou Rhousopoulos, Athens; by 1874, purchased by Samuel G. Ward from Prof. A.S. Rhousopoulos, Athens; acquired in 1875, gift of Samuel G. Ward.
Lüders, O. 1873. "Atena e Marsia." Bullettino dell'Instituto di corrispondenza archeologica, 8-9: p. 169.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1875. Fifth Annual Report of the Trustees of the Association for the Year ending May 1, 1875. p. 70, New York.
Sybel, Ludwig von. 1879. Athena und Marsyas : Gratulationsschrift der Universität Marburg an das Kais. Deutsche Archäologische Institut in Rom zu dessen 50 jähriger Stiftungsfeier am 21 April 1879. p. 15, Marburg: Deutsches Archaologisches Institut.
Conze, Alexander. 1887. "Athena und Marsyas." Jahrbuch des Kaiserlich Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, 2: pp. 193–95.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1895. The Terracottas and Pottery of the Cesnola Collection of Cypriote Antiquities in Halls 4 and 15. no. 1753, p. 130, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Pausanias. 1898. Pausanias's Description of Greece (translation and commentary), Vol. II. p. 294, London, New York: Macmillan Publishers Ltd.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1917. Handbook of the Classical Collection. p. 126, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Beazley, John D. 1918. Attic Red-Figured Vases in American Museums. p. 183, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Beazley, John D. 1925. Attische Vasenmaler des rotfigurigen Stils. no. 5, p. 450, Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr.
Hahland, Walter. 1931. Studien zur attischen Vasenmalerei um 400 v. Chr.. Ph.D. Diss.. p. 55, Marburg: Universität Marburg.
Richter, Gisela M. A. and Marjorie J. Milne. 1935. Shapes and Names of Athenian Vases. pp. 4–5, fig. 38, New York: Plantin Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. and Lindsley F. Hall. 1936. Red-Figured Athenian Vases in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. no. 153, pp. 193–94, pls. 152, 173, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Magi, Filippo. 1939-1940. "Oinopion." Annuario della Scuola archeologica di Atene e delle missioni italiane in Oriente, 1-2: pp. 70–1, fig. 8.
Beazley, John D. 1942. Attic Red-figure Vase-painters. p. 795, no. 4, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Fuhrmann, H. 1950–51. "Athamas." Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, 65(6): p. 121 n. 1.
Metzger, Henri. 1951. Les représentations dans la céramique attique du IVe siècle. p. 24, Paris: E. de Boccard.
Dugas, Charles. 1952. Les Vases Attiques à figures rouges, Exploration archéologique de Délos, Vol. 21. p. 65, Paris: E. de Boccard.
Verhoogen, Violette. 1954. "Une Péliké retrouvée." Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek, 5. pp. 119–20, 124, 's-Gravenhage, Netherlands: D.A. Daamen's Uitgeversmaatschappij.
Beazley, John D. 1963[1942]. Attic Red-figure Vase-painters, Vols. 1 and 2, 2nd ed. p. 1159, no. 2, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Gericke, Helga. 1970. Gefässdarstellungen auf griechischen Vasen. no. 256, p. 137, no 54
, Berlin: Hessling.
Braun, Karin and Thea Elisabeth Haevernick. 1981. Bemalte Keramik und Glas aus dem Kabirenheiligtum bei Theben, Kabirenheiligtum bei Theben Bd. 4. pp. 6–7, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter & Co.
Queyrel, Anne. 1984. "Scènes apolliniennes et dionysiaques du Peintre de Pothos." Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique, 108(1): pp. 156 n. 88, 157 n. 91.
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). 1986. Vol. 3: Atherion-Eros. "Dionysos," p. 456, no. 369, pl. 339, Zürich: Artemis Verlag.
Lissarrague, Francois. 1990. Aesthetics of the Greek Banquet: Images of Wine and Ritual. pp. 99–100, fig. 80, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Declercq, Amandine. 2017. "Couronnes, vin et théorie des humeurs." Rituels Grecs : Une Expérience Sensible, Evelyne Ugaglia and Adeline Grand-Clément, eds. pp. 92–93, fig. 15, Toulouse: Musée Saint-Raymond, Musée des Antiques de Toulouse.
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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than 30,000 works ranging in date from the Neolithic period to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312.
