Geometric Pitcher: Swans (c. 740–730 BCE): Art, History and Details

Geometric Pitcher: Swans (c. 740–730 BCE) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Swan Painter (Greek, Attic, Late Geometric Ib-IIa).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

A common shape in the Late Geometric period, the pitcher often attains large dimensions, offering the painter multiple zones for decoration. Here, standing leaves encircle the shoulder, while the neck and body bear wide bands with alternating squares of swans and swastikas. Also known as a hooked cross, the swastika appears frequently as a decorative motif in Greek Geometric pottery, without any clear meaning. The swans, though somewhat abstracted to modern eyes, likely represent one of many waterfowl species native to Greece.

Object facts

• Title: Geometric Pitcher: Swans
• Date: c. 740–730 BCE
• Creator attribution: Swan Painter (Greek, Attic, Late Geometric Ib-IIa)
• Culture: Greek, Attic
• Type: Ceramic
• Technique: ceramic
• Dimensions: Overall: 36.2 cm (14 1/4 in.)
• Collection: GR - Greek
• Department: Greek and Roman Art
• Accession number: 1924.259

A detail from the museum

The stylized swans lend their name to the otherwise anonymous decorator of this vase.

Collection credit

Dudley P. Allen Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Beazley Archive. n.d. Beazley Archive Pottery Database. Oxford: Beazley Archive.
• The Brummer Gallery Records. Cloisters (Museum), n.d.
• Hubbell, H. M., and William S. Anderson. Yale Classical Studies, Volume Sixteen. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.