Italo-Geometric Bird Askos (Oil Vessel): Hunter (Herakles?) and Stag

Description

This bird-shaped askos (oil vessel), with a tall filling spout and a pierced beak for pouring, perhaps held perfumed oil for a funerary function. Although the shape likely stems from Italian tradition, the abundantly painted geometric decoration, covering nearly every available surface, derives originally from Greece. Thus scholars have suggested that an immigrant Greek potter working in Etruria may have made the vessel. The sole narrative scene shows a man with a spear leading an antlered animal. If not an anonymous hunter, this could be the earliest known representation of the hero Herakles performing his third labor: capturing the golden-antlered Keryneian hind, or female deer.

Provenance

Said to have been found at Vulci; Norbert Schimmel (1905-1990), New York, NY; The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (1993-)

Italo-Geometric Bird Askos (Oil Vessel): Hunter (Herakles?) and Stag

Bisenzio Class

c. 700 BCE

Accession Number

1993.1

Medium

ceramic

Dimensions

Overall: 33.5 x 15.5 cm (13 3/16 x 6 1/8 in.); Diameter of foot: 11.9 cm (4 11/16 in.)

Classification

Ceramic

Museum

The Cleveland Museum of Art

Cleveland, United States

Credit Line

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund