(soft music)
Voiceover: We're in the National Archeological
Museum in Athens looking at the Dipylan Vase.
Voiceover: The so-called Dipylan Vase
because it was found near what would later
become the Dipylan Gate in Athens
and a cemetery right near there.
Voiceover: So this is a gigantic, ceramic pot.
It's an anaphora.
But it would have been used as a grave marker
in antiquity and it's big.
It's five feet one inch tall.
Voiceover: Yeah, it's almost as tall as I am.
It's unusual in that we see figures.
We see a narrative scene
and this is something that we see emerging
more and more in the late geometric period.
And geometric is such an obvious name
for the style of this vase.
Voiceover: Well look at the vase,
it's covered from its foot all the way to the
lip of its mouth with sharp edge geometric patterns.
I see meanders, I see diamonds, I see triangles.
This is a pot coming out of that ancient tradition
which really avoided empty space.
Voiceover: We do see black bands around the base
where the neck meets the body
and at the very lip of the vase.
So we do have some black bands designating
the separate parts of the vase.
Voiceover: But the most interesting part
is the fact that we have emerging here
representations of animals and even of people.
As you said we only see that at
the end of the geometric period.
Voiceover: On the neck of the vase
we see deer grazing.
Voiceover: Below that we see what are either goats
or gazelles perhaps or some people have said deer as well.
Voiceover: Lying down or seated.
Voiceover: But notice in both cases
with the deer and with the goats,
it's really a repeated motif so that it is
a continuation of that pattern that is so much a part
even of the non-figurative areas of the pot.
Voiceover: It's true in the bodies of the animals
are reduced to geometric shapes,
each one is exactly identical to the one before
and the one after and they're almost
easy to miss as animal figures.
Voiceover: Because they are so much a part
of the pattern of the pot.
Voiceover: Exactly.
Voiceover: But in the main phrase
at the shoulder of the pot,
almost at its widest point.
Voiceover: Right where the handles meet the body.
Voiceover: We see a number of mourning figures
on either side of the body of a dead woman.
Voiceover: Now we know it's a woman
because she is wearing a skirt
and different genders were identified in that way
and she's lying on a funeral [bure]
with a shroud held above her.
Voiceover: You see figures pulling at their hair,
this is a symbol of mourning.
Some people have even interpreted the little
M-shaped patterns falling between the figures as tears.
Voiceover: Look at how the artist
has avoided leaving any space blank.
Even between those M-shapes,
he's painted little star shapes
to fill in the blank spaces.
Voiceover: Below the dead woman we can see
perhaps the family.
We see larger figures on their knees
and then we see smaller figures,
perhaps the children.
Voiceover: The bodies are upside down triangles.
The legs are lozenges.
Everything is very reduced
and the figures are all rendered as black silhouettes.
Now the Greeks had a very specific way
of firing pots to get the red ground
and the black figures above it.
Voiceover: So this is not glaze in the modern sense,
instead this is slip wear.
So slip is fine particles of clay
that are suspended in water
and then painted on the surface of the pot.
Now this was very difficult because when you painted
on that slip it was the same color
as the dry clay before it was fired.
But then it was the next step that was important.
Voiceover: It was fired in a kiln
at about 900 degrees.
Voiceover: That's Celsius.
Voiceover: It was fired in a wake where
oxygen was withdrawn from the kiln.
This causes the entire pot to turn black.
Voiceover: The kiln was then allowed to cool somewhat
and then oxygen was allowed back into the kiln
and then what happens is,
the parts of the vase that are not painted
return to their warm, red color
and only the parts that were painted remain black.
And so you can imagine how difficult this was to
control in the ancient world before thermometers.
Voiceover: It really is an amazing testament
to the skill of Greek potters.
Voiceover: Well the person who actually
fashioned this pot produced it on a wheel
but had to produce it in sections
and then fit these sections together seamlessly.
Voiceover: This is a great example of
late geometric Greek pottery.
(soft music)