Detail of a Corinthian Column Krater with Herakles and Hesione Attacking a Monster in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, July 2011

Mixing bowl (column krater) with a man and woman confronting a monster

Greek

Archaic Period, Late Corinthian

about 550 B.C.

Place of Manufacture: Greece, Corinthia, Corinth

Medium/Technique Ceramic, Black Figure

Dimensions Height: 33 cm (13 in.); diameter: 41 cm (16 1/8 in.)

Credit Line Helen and Alice Colburn Fund

Accession Number: 63.420

Description: This large column krater is elaborately decorated with both abstract and figurative motifs. The upper part of the broad, flat rim of the vessel is painted with a braid pattern that becomes a floral chain in one section. Each handle plate bears the image of a man’s head slightly overlapping a woman’s head, both represented in profile and wearing fillets. The outer part of the rim is painted with a series of squares: this same decoration is repeated on the widest part of the belly of the vessel, where it separates the two figurative friezes.

A series of alternating red and black tongues are painted at the top of the upper frieze on the shoulder of the vessel. This tongue pattern is unevenly rendered, and in places overlapped by the figures populating the narrative. The upper frieze is divided into two parts, separated by pairs of confronted and overlapping cocks standing beneath each handle. On the obverse, a helmeted charioteer drives his horses off to the left. A man and a woman (perhaps Herakles and Hesione) face towards the right, confronting a monster just behind the charioteer. Both figures attack the creature, the man firing arrows and the woman throwing rocks. This frightening monster has been identified as a dragon, a mythical opponent of Hesione and Herakles, perhaps inspired by the sight of a fossil. On the reverse, a procession of nine men in elaborate dress are depicted in the upper frieze, with 3 wreaths hanging in the background.

The lower continuous frieze contains a series of real animals and mythical creatures, including sphinxes, geese and griffins, panthers, and a dove mid-flight. Two cocks stand confronted with an ornament that may represent a thunderbolt just beneath the monster in the upper frieze. Below this bottom frieze is a series of dark brown bands. The bowl rests on a broad foot, also painted dark brown.

Provenance1963, sold by Robert E. Hecht, Jr. (dealer; b. 1919 - d. 2012), Boston, to the MFA. (Accession Date: April 10, 1963)

Text from: collections.mfa.org/objects/259823/mixing-bowl-column-krater-with-a-man-and-woman-confronting