Penthesilea, the queen of the Amazons who assisted the Trojans in the Trojan War, was killed by the Greek hero Achilles. He fell in love with her even as he dealt the mortal blow. The Berlin Painter wraps the figures diagonally around the shoulder of the kalpis. For artistic effect, Penthesilea is disproportionately tall and assumes an unnaturally balletic pose. The composition, however, is admirably appropriate for its placement.
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Title:Terracotta hydria: kalpis (water jar)
Artist:Attributed to the Berlin Painter
Period:Classical
Date:ca. 500 BCE
Culture:Greek, Attic
Medium:Terracotta; red-figure
Dimensions:H. 14 7/16 in. (36.6 cm) diameter 12 1/4 in. (31.1 cm)
Classification:Vases
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1910
Object Number:10.210.19
Said to be from Falerii
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1911. "Department of Classical Art: The Accessions of 1910. II. Vases." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 6(2): p. 34, fig. 14.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1917. Handbook of the Classical Collection. p. 102, fig. 61, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1927. Handbook of the Classical Collection. pp. 121–22, fig. 79, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1930. Handbook of the Classical Collection. pp. 121–22, fig. 79, 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. 14, pp. 38–38, pls. 16, 172, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1944, 1949. Greek Painting: The Development of Pictorial Representation from Archaic to Graeco-Roman Times. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1946. Attic Red-Figured Vases: A Survey. pp. 40, 60, 63–64, figs. 7, 17, 24*, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1953. Handbook of the Greek Collection. pp. 72, 213, pl. 53g, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
von Bothmer, Dietrich. 1957. Amazons in Greek Art. no. 22, p. 143, pl. 71, 1, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Bandinelli, Ranuccio Bianchi. 1958. Enciclopedia dell'Arte Antica, Classica e Orientale, Vol. 2. p. 60, fig. 98, Rome: Instituto della Enciclopedia Italiana.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1958[1946]. Attic Red-Figured Vases: A Survey, Revised Edition, 2nd edn. pp. 40, 60, 63–64, figs. 7, 17, 24*, New Haven: Yale University Press.
Beazley, John D. 1963[1942]. Attic Red-figure Vase-painters, Vols. 1 and 2, 2nd ed. p. 209, no. 169, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1970. Perspective in Greek and Roman Art. p. 25, n. 2, figs. 101a, 101b, New York and London: Phaidon Press.
Beazley, John D. 1971. Paralipomena: Additions to Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters and to Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters [2nd edition]. p. 343, Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). 1981. Vol. 1: Aara-Aphlad. "Achilleus," p. 164, no. 734; "Amazones," p. 605, no. 289, pl. 131, Zürich: Artemis Verlag.
Bol, Renate. 1998. Amazones Volneratae: Untersuchungen ze den Ephesischen Amazonenstauen. fig. 147b, n. 655, Mainz am Rhein: Verlag Philipp von Zabern.
Ambrosini, Laura. 2005. "Circolazione della Ceramica Attica nell’Agro Falisco e Volsiniese: un Confronto." Orvieto, l'Etruria meridionale interna e l'agro falisco: atti del XII convegno internazionale di studi sulla storia e l'archeologia dell'Etruria, Annali della Fondazione per il Museo Claudio Faina, 12, Giuseppe M. della Fina, ed. pp. 302, 311, Rome: Quasar.
Padgett, J. Michael. 2017. The Berlin Painter and His World : Athenian Vase-Painting in the Early Fifth Century B.C. no. 65, pp. 42, 332–33, 383, New Haven: Yale University Press.
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