750 bc, 14" Tall - Item #V89
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This classic geometric amphora from 750 b.c. was found in a grave in the ancient Dipylon cemetery in Athens. It now rests in the National Museum in Athens. The geometric designs on this vase include recurring band patterns of meanders, triangles, and checkerboards, and stylized representations of gazelles around the neck.Artists seemed to place the most important figures at the visual focal point of the vase: the handle zone. This seems to be the first attempt at story telling on a vase. The central scene on the front of this vase, is the "prothesis"- the laying out of the deceased’s body on the funeral bier. The humans are very stylized, little more than triangle and stick figures. The figures with the raised arms are tearing their hair morning. This vase, and others like it, were used either to hold ashes and bones of the deceased, or as surface grave markers.
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