Apulian Pottery - Red-Figure Ware: Red-figure Plate
Inv. No.: 89.002
Provenance: Apulia
Date: 4th century BC
Height: 30mm
Diameter: 135mm
Gift of an anonymous donor.
A small plate with a shallow, slightly concave floor and an offset rim. There is a low, hollow foot with a short, grooved stem and a disc base. The main colours are black, the orange-red of the clay, plus red wash and added white or yellow/white. The underside is painted black except for a reserved band around its outer edge and underneath the rim. The foot is reserved except for the edge of the disc, which is painted black (rather worn). The upper surface is decorated with a central red-figure profile female head, perhaps deriving from depictions of either Aphrodite or Persephone, and bands of floral and geometric patterns. The vase is in very good condition.
Function:
A serving plate, used for domestic or funerary purposes.
Manufacture:
A wheel-thrown vase.
Decoration:
- The rim is decorated with a band of short, vertical black lines.
- On the floor there is an outer band of white lotus buds on black with an incised central orange stem, a reserved band with a central black line and in the black central tondo there is the profile head of a woman, facing left. Her hair is covered with a saccos painted with bands of decorative patterns in the following sequence from right to left: yellow/white crosses, short black lines, yellow/white dots, a thick wavy yellow/white line, more yellow/white dots and short black lines. She also wears a stephane, an earring and a necklace, all painted in yellow/white. She faces a phiale with details painted in yellow/white.
Bibliography:
Cambitoglou, A., "Groups of Apulian Red-Figured Vases Decorated with Heads of Women or of Nike", Journal of Hellenic Studies, LXXIV (1954), 111-121.
Trendall, A. D., Red Figure Vases of South Italy and Sicily: a Handbook, London, Thames and Hudson, 1989, 92-93, 264.
Comparanda:
Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum, Italia 15, Taranto 1 (undated), IV d,r, Tavola 11, 2 (small plate with female head).
Kranz, P. and R. Lullies, Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum, Deutschland 38, Kassel 2 (1975), Tafel 81, 1 (larger plate, but similar head and decorated saccos).
Trendall, A. D. and A. Cambitoglou, The Red-Figured Vases of Apulia, Oxford, Clarendon, 1982, II, Plate 377, 6 and 7 (similar heads on plates by the White Saccos Painter).