Detail of a Terracotta Neck-Amphora Attributed to the Ptoon Painter in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, July 2011

Terracotta neck-amphora (jar)

Attributed to the Ptoon Painter

Period: Archaic

Date: ca. 570–560 B.C.

Culture: Greek, Attic

Medium: Terracotta; black-figure

Dimensions: Overall: 14 3/4 x 10 3/8in. (37.4 x 26.3cm) diameter of mouth 5 15/16in. (15cm)

Classification: Vases

Credit Line: Gift of Eugene Holman, 1959

Accession Number: 59.64

Description: Obverse, banqueting scene, possibly Dionysos and Ariadne
Reverse, Herakles and Acheloös

By the second quarter of the sixth century B.C., figural subjects and particularly mythological motifs predominated over animal friezes on Attic vases. The man-headed bull on the reverse identifies the scene as Herakles subduing the river-god Acheloös. The banquet on the obverse may depict the god of wine, Dionysos, with Ariadne, a daughter of King Minos of Crete. Dionysos married her after she was abandoned by the Athenian hero Theseus.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/255056