Greek
An Attic oinochoe in the form of a female head, circa 500-450 BC
Pottery
Height: 14 cm
Further images
In the form of a female head with finely painted eyes and brows. The oinochoe with a trefoil lip and high arching handle. Condition The body is intact. The handle...
In the form of a female head with finely painted eyes and brows. The oinochoe with a trefoil lip and high arching handle.
Condition
The body is intact. The handle has been reattached, with some restoration. The trefoil lip has been restored. There has been minor retouching to the black glaze on the face and hair. The nose is restored. The vessel appears to have been waxed.
Condition
The body is intact. The handle has been reattached, with some restoration. The trefoil lip has been restored. There has been minor retouching to the black glaze on the face and hair. The nose is restored. The vessel appears to have been waxed.
Provenance
Bonhams London, Fine Antiquities, 6 July 1993, lot 330Christie's, London, 20 May 2007, lot 86
Literature
Towards the end of the 6th century BC and throughout the 5th, Greek potters produced a number of sculptural or plastically rendered vases called 'head vases'. These vases mostly took the shape of female heads, heads of foreigners, and mythological figures such as Herakles.This oinochoe can most likely be attributed to Class N: The Cook Class of head vases. The group was named by Beazley after an example formerly in the collection of A.B Cook. The Cook class consists mainly of oinochoe in the form of female heads. Beazley described this group as "unpretentious with an archaic alertness of expression", J.D. Beazley, Charinos: Attic Vases in the Form of Human Heads in 'Journal of Hellenic Studies' 49, 1929, pp. 38-78. For a similar example, see The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, accession no. 01.8.7. See also Beazley Archive, 218582 and 13800.