neck-amphora

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Object Type: neck-amphora
Museum number: 1886,0401.1105
Description: Shoulder sherd of Milesian Fikellura pottery neck-amphora; white slip; exterior: above, band of black tongues with dilute line below; painted decoration consisting of sphinx (head, raised foreleg, chest, back and part of wing with added red remaining), to right; at right, rear of goat with red on rump, to right; dot rosette, small ivy leaf with dot above and small lotus flower as filling ornament.
Cultures/periods: East Greek; Archaic Greek
Production date: 550BC-535BC (circa)
Production place: Made in: Miletus
Excavator/field collector: Excavated by: Egypt Exploration Fund
Findspot: Excavated/Findspot: Sanctuary of Apollo (Naukratis) (in Register)
Materials: pottery
Ware: Fikellura
Technique: painted; slipped
Dimensions: Height: 6.90 centimetres; Thickness: 0.50 centimetres; Width: 9 centimetres
Curator's comments: For confronted sphinxes with goat between, compare the neck-amphora in Bucharest (Walter-Karydi 1973, pl. 85, no. 623). The neat ornament suggests an early date. According to Cook, the sphinx's hairstyle is highly unusual. The sherd falls within Cook's Group F of "other amphorae with animals or birds on shoulder".
Bibliographic references: CVA British Museum 8 / Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum: Great Britain 13, British Museum 8 (p. 9, no, 9, pl. 8, no. 9); Cook 1933-1934 / Fikellura Pottery (p. 12, no. 2); Walter-Karydi 1973 / Samische Gefässe des 6. Jahrhunderts vor Christi: Landschaftsstile ostgriechischer Gefässe (p. 125, no. 622); Möller 2000 / Naukratis, Trade in Archaic Greece (p. 245, no. 1); Villing et al. 2013-2025 / Naukratis: Greeks in Egypt (GF.038)
Location: Not on display
Subjects: sphinx; mammal
Acquisition name: Donated by: Egypt Exploration Fund
Acquisition date: 1886
Department: Greek and Roman
Registration number: 1886,0401.1105

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