Large Cypriot Brown Ware Storage Jar

Formed as a horn with applied filigree and granule detailing below the rim. 0.59 grams, 12 mm



Ex collection of the Chierroni family, Paris, France, formed between 1980-1990s. Property of a French collector.

Comprising a round pedestal supporting four small offering pots, interspersed with four female face protomes; looped handle to the centre with parallel strokes in low-relief. 623 grams, 16 cm high



From the West German collection of H.W. Acquired from the De Mynter, Belgium, in 2011. with Gorny and Mosch, Munich, 3 June 2017, no.52. Private Portuguese R.M. collection. Accompanied by a previous catalogue information slip.

The kernos can be recognised by a series of small cups on the lip, with examples dating back to the Bronze Age. It was used to store offerings made to the gods, specifically in cults pertaining to Demeter and Persephone. The receptacles probably contained foodstuffs, or perhaps flowers, and a lamp was sometimes placed in the centre. Kernoses, such as this, were often carried in processions at the Eleusinian Mysteries (secret initiation rites celebrating the goddesses Demeter and Persephone) and were an important object for Greek religious life. Kernoses are thus closely related to the agrarian cult and to the myth of Persephone and Demeter, the goddess of fertility and agriculture. The myth is recounted in an Homeric Hymn (c. 650 B.C.) according to which Persephone, Demeter’s daughter, was seized by Hades, the king of the underworld, who brought her to his kingdom to make her his wife. Distraught, Demeter caused a terrible drought, which continued until Persephone returned to her mother from the underworld. Having consumed pomegranate seeds whilst she was in the Underworld, she was only able to be with her for a few months of the year.

Decorated with a meander with saltire squares below the figural scenes, and a laurel below the rim; Side A: a nude gesticulating satyr with short curly hair and long beard, running to the right with his left leg raised and his arms outstretched, characteristic pointed ears and pug nose, towards a maenad moving right and looking back at him, her hair short and curly, her body draped in a chiton, with another maenad standing behind him, facing left, draped in a himation over a chiton; Side B: three youths in draped cloaks with hoods thrown back; professionally restored. 2.1 kg, 29 cm wide

Fine condition, professionally restored.

Belgian private collection, 1950s. with Christie's, New York, 4 June 2008, no.190. Private central European collection. Accompanied by a copy of the relevant Christie's catalogue pages. Accompanied by an academic report by Dr Raffaele D’Amato. This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by a search certificate number no.12067-218141.

The style allows us to attribute this vase to an unknown artist of Lucanian origin: it is in ancient Lucania (a region which is located between present-day Calabria and Basilicata, in Southern Italy and between the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Ionian Sea, with Metaponto as a well-known city) that the first Italic style of red-figure painting developed.