Terracotta volute-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water)

Karkinos Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, the abduction of Antiope by Theseus Reverse, Amazons riding up In its mythological beginnings, Athens was attacked by the Amazons, warrior women whose homeland lay to the north and east of the Black Sea. The incursion was repulsed, and Theseus, the ruler of Athens, took Antiope, the Amazon queen, as his wife. Of special interest on the obverse is the shield device of a flute-playing crab. The motif plays on the name of a famous flute-player in late-sixth century B.C. Athens, Karkinos, crab. The device occurs again on the reverse of the calyx-krater by Euphronios and Euxitheos (1972.11.10) exhibited in the Greek galleries on the main floor.

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