DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.4593#0271
THE SHRINES OF ATTICA 247
IX
SOME GREEK VASES
One of them is a bowl with a double handle. It
would hold just about enough oatmeal for my morn-
ing breakfast portion ; but I have never yet desecrated
it to any base utility. It is black, the only color being
round the base. A little pitcher with a scalloped
rim combines portliness with grace, — a thing not easy
to accomplish. It is black, Attic in form, but without
decoration. Then there arc two little pitchers from
Tanagra, the large one about four inches high, the
smaller one not more than three. It is doubtful if
the smaller one was ever used for what it could hold,
or the large one either, for that matter. They may
have been used as toys or ornaments, but were de-
voted to the dead more likely than to the living. The
features are sharply and distinctly cut. It is the face
of a woman. The nose is very long, and the counte-
nance has a decidedly Egyptian cast. I suppose it
was not a portrait of an individual, but of a type, — a
composite picture, so to speak, by the artist's instinct
made radical and typical.
I should like to know the history of this little vase,
— what eyes looked upon it, who tenderly handled it,
or to whom it was dedicated among the grave offerings.
For nobody whom we ever heard of; for somebody,
it may be, who lived the common round of life, whose
heart was warm and whose hand willing, and who
smiled and danced and helped to make life as joyous
IX
SOME GREEK VASES
One of them is a bowl with a double handle. It
would hold just about enough oatmeal for my morn-
ing breakfast portion ; but I have never yet desecrated
it to any base utility. It is black, the only color being
round the base. A little pitcher with a scalloped
rim combines portliness with grace, — a thing not easy
to accomplish. It is black, Attic in form, but without
decoration. Then there arc two little pitchers from
Tanagra, the large one about four inches high, the
smaller one not more than three. It is doubtful if
the smaller one was ever used for what it could hold,
or the large one either, for that matter. They may
have been used as toys or ornaments, but were de-
voted to the dead more likely than to the living. The
features are sharply and distinctly cut. It is the face
of a woman. The nose is very long, and the counte-
nance has a decidedly Egyptian cast. I suppose it
was not a portrait of an individual, but of a type, — a
composite picture, so to speak, by the artist's instinct
made radical and typical.
I should like to know the history of this little vase,
— what eyes looked upon it, who tenderly handled it,
or to whom it was dedicated among the grave offerings.
For nobody whom we ever heard of; for somebody,
it may be, who lived the common round of life, whose
heart was warm and whose hand willing, and who
smiled and danced and helped to make life as joyous