The detail of the face painted on this terracotta jar that is associated with weddings (called lebes gamikos) is extraordinary, considering it is from the 3rd century B.C.
It is from the ancient town of Centuripe in Enna province, which was, at one time, one of Sicily’s biggest producers of ceramic objects. This vase illustrates the “elaborate applied decoration and refined polychorme tempera painting executed after firing” (from Sicily: Art and Invention between Greece and Rome) for which Centuripe was known. The jar is part of the collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
