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Oil flask (lekythos) with two visitors at a tomb
Greek
Classical Period
about 440–430 B.C.
Place of Manufacture: Greece, Attica, Athens
Medium/Technique
Ceramic, White Ground
Dimensions
Overall: 40.3 x 13.5 cm (15 7/8 x 5 5/16 in.)
Credit Line
Henry Lillie Pierce Fund
Accession Number00.359
CollectionsAncient Greece and Rome
ClassificationsVessels
Catalogue Raisonné
Caskey-Beazley, Attic Vase Paintings (MFA), no. 060.
DescriptionTo the left of the short, wide tomb monument, a nude youth stands in with right hand on hip and cloak (chlamys) draped over his left arm and holding two spears in his left hand upright. He wears a sword and scabbard held by a baldric diagonally across his chest. The young woman approaching the stele from the left holds a specialized perfume vessel called a plemochoe by the base in her right hand and several red fillets in her left, as well as a writing tablet (now badly faded). The young woman appears nude, as the original delicate color (likely Egyptian blue or ochre) has entirely faded away. A vegetal wreath has been hung on the stele, a black fillet has been draped over the pediment, and a small black lekythos that had been left on the base on a previous visit is tipped over.
Condition: Repaired with slight restoration.
Condition: Repaired with slight restoration.
ProvenanceBy 1888: W. Paton Collection; by date unknown: with Edward Perry Warren (according to Warren's records: Paton & Blacker Collections); February 1900: purchased by MFA from Edward Perry Warren