Name:	Attic Small Black Figure Neck Handled Amphora
Picture:
Description:	H. 16.7cm, max. diam. 16.3cm, diam. at foot 6.1cm. Except for a few minor chips on the lip and some worn areas of glaze, the piece is intact. Fine buff clay. Body covered in gray buff slip, now quite dirty. Interior and exterior lip and top of foot black. Exterior handles careless patchy black. On either side of neck, between handles, two opposed rows of three heart shapes with dots between, separated by a horizontal wavy line. Row of short tongues at base of neck between handles. About 4cm above the base is a 1cm wide black band with rays below. Main scene: beneath each handle a leopard or panther facing right but with frontal head. Spots in added dull brownish purple. On one side, seated Dionysus, facing right, looks left at maenad. She is dancing left but looks right. Other side, maenad looks right at warrior, with large round shield, running or falling to right. All figures in shiny black glaze with incised detail and some added brownish purple paint -- Dionysus' beard and stripes on
Date:	500-480 B.C.
Discussion:	This is an amphora of Beazeley's 'light make' class characterised by a black band above the rays. The scenes are commonly Dionysiac, J.D. Beazeley Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters (1956) pp. 593-4. For a similar ivy pattern on the neck see CVA Suisse 3, pl. 55 6.1. Presumably Attic, although many were found in Italy.