Search

V-patterns on Bronze Age Pottery

Photograph of a stirrup jar, buff clay with red decoration, from a high angle against a neutral gray background.
A Mycenaean stirrup jar in CU's collection bears a v-shaped pattern on its shoulders in the spaces between the handles, as well as between the handles and spout. This pattern is frequently found on such stirrup jars in the central or handle zone (1). The motif is perhaps a simplification of an iris motif from Minoan Cretan art, in particular Furumark's Motif 10A:9. This particular example corresponds closely to Furumark's Motif 59.

This essay was written to accompany a collection of Greek artifacts at the CU Art Museum. 

Footnote

  1. Arne Furumark, The Mycenaean Pottery: Analysis and Classification (Stockholm: Victor Pettersons Bokindustriaktiebolag, 1941): 262, 385.