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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
The Ashmolean Museum has recently acquired a fragmentary, but none the less attractive Attic cup. The interior is decorated in the white-ground technique, but the artist has used red-figure on the exterior. The internal and external decoration do not differ merely in technique, however, but also in mood: the central tondo bears a cool, restrained scene of a girl pouring a libation, whereas outside we have a mildly drunken rout—a komos.
The interior (Plate XVIIa) is mostly white. There is a broad black band around the edge, at some distance in from which is a dilute brown line which circumscribes the tondo itself. This is decorated with a scene of a girl standing between two altars, over one of which she pours a libation. She faces towards the left and much of her body is seen in three-quarter view. Unfortunately her face is damaged, but enough remains to show that it was once pretty and appealing. On her head she wears a broad cloth band through which her back-hair emerges in a kind of chignon. She wears earrings. A himation edged in red is thrown loosely over her left shoulder and hangs down to well below her knees. Beneath, she wears a flimsy chiton which is pulled revealingly tight over her right breast and is buttoned at the elbow. Bracelets in the form of snakes adorn her wrists, and in her right hand she holds an oinochoe. This last, in common with the bracelets, buttons and earrings, is rendered plastically (i.e. is in relief), and was perhaps originally gilded. To her left, a rod or sceptre leans independently, while on either side can be seen parts of two altars, which, if identical, consisted of two plain, swelling mouldings, somewhat archaic in character, above a row of ovolos, and beneath on the sides, a metope between two dark strips. Some preliminary sketch is visible. Much of the detailed drawing is done in relief line, reinforced around the edges of the garment and on the altar with applied red. Dilute paint is used for the hair, the hem of the chiton and the decoration immediately above it, and for the triglyphs (if that is what they are) of the altars.
1 Accession number 1973.1. Presented by Mr N. Koutoulakis in memory of Sir John Beazley. Diameter: 24·5 cm. Restored height: 10·7 cm.
2 For snake bracelets, cf. e.g. R. A. Higgins, Greek and Roman Jewellery (London, 1961) 172.
3 For gilded relief vases, see J. V. Noble, The Technique of Attic Painted Pottery (London, 1965) 63–4, figs. 218–19. At the suggestion of Dr von Bothmer the surface of the oinochoe was analysed. Dr Robert Hedges of the Oxford Archaeological Research Laboratory carried out the analysis by means of X-ray fluorescence, and reports that the surface was plated with tin.
4 For an altar with similar metopes, see the volutekrater no. 269 by the Niobid Painter in Bologna, beneath the handle to the right of side A: CVA Bologna v, pl. 102, 4.
5 ARV 2 626, 104; Paralipomena 398, 104.
6 No. T.436; ARV 2 626, 105; CVA Kassel i, pls. 37, 3 and 4, 39, 2.
7 Karls Universität, inv. 512; Paralipomena 399, 105 bis.
8 No. 514; ARV 2 626, 106.
9 Agora P 17788; ARV 1 627, 8, Paralipomena 399, 105 ter.
10 No. 5993; ARV 2 625, 102.
11 No. 2522; ARV 2 625, 101.
12 ‘Phyllobolia’, Archeologia Classica ii (1950) 31–45, pl. vi and pl. A—B.
13 No. 486; ARV 2 626, 108.
14 E.g., on the Prague, Villa Giulia and Würzburg cups.
15 ARV 2 625, 100.
16 ARV 2 619, 12. Known to me from a photograph by Dr von Bothmer.
17 ARV 2 625, 93. I am grateful to Dr W. Hornbostel for supplying photographs. They are reproduced by permission of the Direction of the Archaeological Institute, University of Giessen.
18 ARV 2 624, 87; Paralipomena, 398.
19 ARV 2 625, 89.
20 T. B. L. Webster, ‘Tondo composition in archaic and classical Greek art’, Jhs lix (1939) 118, n. 63.
21 E. F. van der Grinten, ‘On the composition of the medallions in the interiors of Greek black- and red-figured kylixes’, Verhandelingen d. Koninklijke Ned. Akademie van Wetenschappen, Afd. Letterkunde, N. R. lxxii, 2 (Amsterdam, 1966) 51, n. 2. Thus, the same feature appears on the following cups in Oxford: ARV 2 393, 37 (by the Painter of Munich 2676); 364, 42 (by the Triptolemos Painter); 795, 104 (by the Euaion Painter).
22 E. Simon, Opfernde Götter (Berlin, 1953) 72–3;H. Metzger, Recherches sur l'imagerie athénienne (Paris, 1965) 26.
23 N. M. Inv. 2187. A. Furtwängler, Am vi (1881) pl. 4; M. Collignon and L. Couve, Catalogue des vases peints du Musée National d'Athènes (Paris, 1902) 584, no. 1844; H. Philippart, Les coupes attiques a fond blanc (Brussels, 1936) 61–2, fig. 3, no. 48; J. D. Beazley, Gnomon xiii (1937) 291; H. Metzger, op. cit., 22, no. 48, pl. X, 1 (the only published photograph).
24 Professor Robertson's suggestion.
24a The identification with Kore is confirmed by Dr von Bothmer's reading κ]όρης of an inscription in dilute paint to the left of the girl's face—previously dismissed by me as the unevenly worn surface of the white slip.
25 J. Constantinou, ̔Λευκὴ Δελφικὴ κύλιξ̕ Ae 1970, 27–46, pl. 10–12; A. Waiblinger, ‘Remarques sur une coupe à fond blanc du Musée du Louvre’, Ra, 1972, 240–2.
26 ARV 2 330, 5.
27 E.g. P. E. Arias, M. Hirmer and B. B. Shefton, A History of Greek Vase Painting (London 1962) 359; R. M. Cook, Greek Painted Pottery, 2nd edn (London 1972) 176.
28 J. Mertens, ‘A white-ground cup by Euphronios’, HSCP lxxvi (1972) 271–81, pls 1–4.
29 Ibid., 281.
30 J. D. Beazley, Attic Red-figured Vases in American Museums (Cambridge, 1918) 153.
31 Idem., ‘The Master of the Villa-Giulia calyxkrater’, RM xxvii (1912) 286.
