Terracotta funerary plaque

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Prothesis (laying out of the dead) During the Archaic period, burial shafts in Attica were often covered by solid, rectangular, house-like structures with plastered mud-brick walls and slightly sloping roofs. A series of terracotta plaques showing different stages of the funeral were probably set into the outer walls. In this very early example, the deceased is shown lying on a bier surrounded by mourners.

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