So-called “Kertscher Vase”: Heads of Goddess, griffin and horse

This object is a storage vessel (pelike). The middle of the stomach image occupies a female head, which in profile is turned to the right. The woman’s skin is reproduced by white paint, the hair is held at the back of the head by a hood (sphendone). On their right side there is a horse’s head and bridle; on the left, the head of a griffin (mythical hybrid of lion and eagle), which is also painted in white, can be seen. The vase is a genus of the so-called “Kertscher ceramic,” named after its most important location in the area of the ancient city of Pantikapaion in Crimea (present-day Kertsch in Ukraine), originally a Greek colony, which was founded in the 5th century. BC becomes the capital of the Bosporan Empire. There, the result is a merging of indigenous and Scythian and Greek cultures. In the 4th century BC the Bosporan Empire becomes one of the most important cereal suppliers in Athens, which exports ceramics to it. The painting of these export vases reflects the partly fantastic ideas of the Athenians about this territory: it is said that not far from the Crimean Peninsula there are the legendary stripes that protect their gold from the people of the one-eyed Arimaspen. The woman portrayed must be an unnamable, local goddess. At least the worship of a “Great Goddess” as well as the Greek historian Herodotus (5th century BC) is known. (Archaeological Museum of the EMU Münster)