Unknown Maker, Greek

In the 8th century BCE, human and animal figures began to appear along with the usual bands of geometric patterns on Athenian pots. The preparation for burial was a favorite subject, as shown in the panel on the neck of this pitcher, in which six women take part in a funerary procession. At the vessel’s shoulder is a frieze of six horses grazing while a bird watches. Large ceramic vases such as this, some as high as five feet and often decorated with funerary representations, functioned as grave markers during the Geometric period. By the 6th century BCE, stone sculptures increasingly replaced large ceramic vessels as funerary monuments.