Skyphos with Linear Decoration
Skyphos with Linear Decoration
Skyphos with Linear Decoration
The skyphos is a vessel designed primarily for drinking wine at banquets (symposia): the term refers to a rather deep, elegantly shaped cup with two horizontal handles, which was particularly common in Corinth. It is sometimes also called a kotyle.
First half of the 7th century B.C.
D (with handles) : 18.5 cm
In stock
Product Description
The skyphos is a vessel designed primarily for drinking wine at banquets (symposia): the term refers to a rather deep, elegantly shaped cup with two horizontal handles, which was particularly common in Corinth. It is sometimes also called a kotyle.
This example, remarkable for its lightness (the wall is very thin), has an almost conical body; it is supported by a small ring-shaped foot with a barely rounded rim. The decoration, which is extremely understated and purely geometric, is executed with remarkable precision: rays above the foot, concentric lines, and a frieze of vertical lines emphasising the rim. The interior is entirely painted.
From the 6th century BC onwards, the skyphos was quickly superseded as a drinking vessel by the great success of the Attic kylix. This new form, flatter, more spacious and better suited to serving as a canvas for painted scenes, replaced the bowls produced by Corinthian and Greco-Oriental workshops, not only in Greece but also throughout the colonial world and in Etruria.
