Vatican Museums

Between the end of the eighth and the seventh century B.C., Corinth held almost absolute primacy in terms of exportation to Mediterranean markets, and its extremely refined products were widespread in Etruria and southern Italy. The olpe (jug) is decorated with superimposed friezes with real and fantastical animals: rows of panthers, bulls, deer, herons and sphinxes, with rosettes in the forms of circles of dots on an ivory-coloured background. This vase was produced in Corinth in around 630-615 B.C., in the so-called “Transitional” phase by a painter named on the base of this specimen as “Vatican Painter 73”. This painter’s work [cf. Oinochoe] falls within the canons of Orientalising style and is always characterised by accurate execution resulting in clear and elegant representations.