Obverse and reverse, Dionysos, the god of wine, with his followers, satyrs and maenads
Belonging to the group around the Villa Giulia Painter, the Methyse Painter takes his name from the lyre-playing maenad in front of Dionysos (methyse means "drunk"). The figures' incipient inebriation is subtly suggested. The key is Dionysos—slow-moving with downcast, introverted expression and stabilized by a young satyr who wraps his arms around the god's middle. The satyrs and maenads on the reverse are more active. One maenad holds her thyrsos (fennel stalk) ready to parry an assault. The figures under each handle are engaged in an eternal pursuit.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Terracotta bell-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water)
Artist:Attributed to the Methyse Painter
Period:Classical
Date:ca. 450 BCE
Culture:Greek, Attic
Medium:Terracotta; red-figure
Dimensions:H. 19 1/2 in. (49.5 cm) diameter 22 1/4 in. (56.5 cm)
Classification:Vases
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1907
Object Number:07.286.85
Inscription: The names are inscribed: Oinobios, Maleos, and Myris; Methyse, Chryseis, and Mainas
Said to have been found in ancient Numana, province of Ancona, Italy
Ca. 1901-1902, found by Dr. Girolamo Rilli in the necropolis of Numana; [1907, purchased by Alfredo Barsanti from Dr. G. Rilli]; acquired in 1907, purchased from A. Barsanti.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1917. Handbook of the Classical Collection. p. 122, fig. 78, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1927. Handbook of the Classical Collection. pp. 127–28, fig. 84, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1930. Handbook of the Classical Collection. pp. 127–28, fig. 84, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. and Lindsley F. Hall. 1936. Red-Figured Athenian Vases in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. no. 109, pp. 140–42, pls. 109, 110, 171, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Bieber, Margarete. 1939. The History of the Greek and Roman Theater. p. 11, fig. 18, Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1946. Attic Red-Figured Vases: A Survey. pp. 92, 106, figs. 32m, 78, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1953. Handbook of the Greek Collection. pp. 86, 228, pl. 68b, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1958[1946]. Attic Red-Figured Vases: A Survey, Revised Edition, 2nd edn. pp. 92, 106, figs. 32m, 78, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Beazley, John D. 1963[1942]. Attic Red-figure Vase-painters, Vols. 1 and 2, 2nd ed. p. 632, no. 3, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Seeberg, Axel. 1971. Corinthian Komos Vases. p. 57, London: University Of London.
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). 1986. Vol. 3: Atherion-Eros. "Chryseis II," p. 282, no. 1, pl. 224; "Dionysos," p. 453, no. 320, Zürich: Artemis Verlag.
Maas, Martha and Jane McIntosh Snyder. 1989. Stringed Instruments of Ancient Greece. pp. 114, 123, 137, fig. 19, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). 1992. Vol. 6: Kentauroi-Oiax. "Mainas," p. 340, no. 4, pl. 176; "Maleos," p. 349, no. 1; "Methyse," p. 565, no. 1; "Myris," p. 691, no. 1, Zürich: Artemis Verlag.
Picón, Carlos A. 2007. Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome no. 145, pp. 132, 433, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
de Menil Gallery. 2009. Uncovering Ancient Greece: Fifty Years of Archaeological Discoveries of Hugh Sackett. p. 13, Groton: The de Menil Gallery, Groton School.
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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.
