Glass jar

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Colorless with pale blue green tinge. Rounded, flaring, tubular rim, folded out and down, forming collar around neck; broad ovoid body; bottom pushed in to form hollow foot ring. On body, sixteen projecting roughly vertical ribs of differing lengths and shapes (some almost straight, others sinuous), four of which extend onto the neck below the collar. Intact, except for one small chip in one of the ribs; some bubbles and a few white glassy inclusions; slight brownish weathering and faint iridescence. Sealed within the rim are fine particles of dry, loose sand.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.

Metropolitan Museum of Art