The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 13, 2025

Black-Figure White-Ground Lekythos (Oil Vessel): Athena between Cocks and Hieropoioi (Officials)

500–485 BCE

attributed to Athena Painter

(Greek, c. 500–475 BCE)
Greek, Attic
Ceramic
Diameter: 10.5 cm (4 1/8 in.); height: 29.7 cm (11 11/16 in.)
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund 2022.42
Location: 102B Greek

Did You Know?

Athena’s skin, typically painted white on black-figure vases, here remains black atop the white ground.

Description

The helmeted war goddess Athena strides forward on this oil vessel, raising her spear and a round shield emblazoned with a red snake. Flanked by two cocks, her pose recalls that on Panathenaic prize vases, the large black-figure amphorae awarded to athletic and equestrian victors in the Panathenaic Games. Beside the roosters stand two bearded, wreathed men, each holding a forked stick. Inscriptions identify the men as hieropoioi (doers of sacred things), officials charged with administration of sacred ceremonies and contests.
  • by 1933
    Jacob Hirsch Collection, New York, NY
    1933-2007
    Albright Knox Gallery, Buffalo, New York, deaccessioned
    June 7, 2007
    (Sale: Sotheby's, New York, NY, June 7, 2007, lot 34)
    2007-2022
    Phoenix Ancient Art, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art
    2022-
    The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Beazley Archive Pottery Database no. 330737 www.beazley.ox.ac.uk
    Haspels, Caroline Henriette Emilie. Attic Black Figured Lekythoi. Paris, 1936. p. 256, Appendix XV, No. 34
    Buffalo Academy of Fine Arts. Blue Book of the Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, in Which Is Incorporated the Albright Art Gallery and the Albright Art School: 1931-1942. Buffalo: Buffalo Fine Arts Academy, 1943. pp. 60 and 121, Fig. a
    Margarete Bieber, "Two Attic Black-Figured Lekythoi in Buffalo," American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 48/2, 1944. pp. 121-129, Fig. 2
    Dunman Ure, Anne "Koes," Journal of Hellenic Studies, Vol. 71, 1951. pl. XLII
    Beazley, J. D. Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956. p. 522, no. 34
    Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Steven A. Nash, Katy Kline, Charlotta Kotik, and Emese Wood. Painting and Sculpture from Antiquity to 1942. 1979. pp. 60-61
    Shapiro, H. A. Art and Cult Under the Tyrants in Athens. Mainz am Rhein: Verlag Philipp von Zabern, 1989. pl.15A (part)
    Neils, Jenifer. Goddess and Polis: The Panathenaic Festival in Ancient Athens : [Exhibition catalogue]. Hanover, N.H.: Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, 1992. pp. 18 and 182, no. 55
    Sotheby's (Firm). Antiquities: Including Property of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York. New York: Sotheby's, 2007. no. 34, pp. 50-51 www.sothebys.com
    "New on View.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine vol. 62, no. 3 (September, 2022): Back cover. Reproduced and Mentioned: Back cover.
  • {{cite web|title=Black-Figure White-Ground Lekythos (Oil Vessel): Athena between Cocks and Hieropoioi (Officials)|url=false|author=Athena Painter|year=500–485 BCE|access-date=13 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/2022.42