Mycenaean Pictorial Vase Painting

Here is a vividly written and fully illustrated assessment of the figured decoration on Late Bronze Age vessels from the Greek mainland, Cyprus, and the Aegean islands. It will become a standard source on the Mycenaean imagination.

Emily Vermeuele and Vassos Karageorghis describe the hunting scenes, chariots, sphinxes and griffins, bulls and birds, people dancing or fighting, and cult scenes on Mycenaean pottery. They analyze forms and styles, sources and influences, and the development of conventions. They relate what is known about the painters and their workshops, and the overseas trade. A catalogue of the 700 remaining whole and broken examples, now in museums around the world, is appended. Over 950 illustrations provide a comprehensive view of the art.

This study tells us much about Bronze Age civilization, and it opens the way to an understanding of the relationship of Greek art to figure drawing in pre-Classical times.