Etruscan Bucchero Oinochoe with Incised Decoration in the Getty Villa, July 2008

Pitcher with Incised Decoration
Unknown
Etruscan, 625 - 600 B.C.
Terracotta
7 7/16 x 4 9/16 in.
86.AE.395

With its dark, shiny surface, Etruscan bucchero pottery is quite distinctive. Developed about 675 B.C. from a local pottery tradition, bucchero is made from clay with the impurities removed. The pots are thrown on a potter's wheel, burnished, and then fired in a kiln with little oxygen, which produces the dark color. Much bucchero pottery appears to imitate metalwork, with its smooth, shiny surface, angular shapes, and incised or relief decoration.

This bucchero oinochoe, or pitcher, shows the influence of artistic ideas from the eastern Mediterranean that poured into Etruria in the 600s B.C. as a result of trade. The row of animals and plants--including panthers, grazing goats, and birds--is very similar to the decoration found on vessels made from gold and silver imported from Egypt and the Near East, which have been found in the tombs of aristocratic families. Etruscan potters reinterpreted the decoration of these precious vessels in the less expensive material of terracotta.

Text from: www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=14346