Floral Black-Figured Cups at Schimatari

Abstract

The later developments of black-figured vase painting in Boeotia are known mainly from the finds made at the Theban Kabeirion and from associated Kabeiric vases which are to be found in some numbers in the museums of Europe. Kabeiric is, however, only one of several B.F. styles that had their vogue in Boeotia in the later fifth and fourth centuries. A still commoner is one in which the decoration consists mainly of floral patterns in which the palmette predominates, with occasionally a bird, animal, or a grotesque human figure introduced in a subordinate position. Vases of various shapes with this decoration are found in some abundance in Greek museums, more especially at Thebes, Chaeronea, Schimatari (Tanagra), Chalcis, Nauplia (where the museum possesses two collections, the Nikandros and the Glymenopoulos Collections, both formed mainly in Boeotia), and the National Museum at Athens. They are not from the same potteries as the Kabeiric vases, though they are akin to them. Their artistic merit is slight, and this is no doubt the reason why so few have reached museums outside Greece, and why still fewer have ever been published. Nevertheless, the fact that they exist in considerable numbers of itself makes them historically important, especially as the fabric has well-marked characteristics which render it possible to trace a chronological sequence and perhaps local styles.