1. Introduction-research questions

Pottery held a different degree of importance for people of the ancient world than it does for archaeologists, whose access to information relies to a great extent upon the state of preservation of material inorganic objects (since most of organic materials have decomposed) and upon the mute character of most of their documents, which only rarely bear inscriptions or graffiti. Although elements, such as dress, hair style, jewels and makeup, were much more important for self-identification and representation of ancient people, fine pottery vessels (used during symposia, other family and religious feasts and as offerings to deities) played an important part as containers for drinks and food as well as for various cosmetics and pigments. Drinking habits were facilitated through the use of fine Greek pottery and constituted an integral part of the Greek way of life in the colonial outposts. Fine pottery was also used in cult practices and burial customs.¹

Around 1980 when the author was compiling his notes (mainly taken in the seventies) for a general overview of Greek fine pottery in the Black Sea region,² he was not yet able to understand well many aspects of this field, having only limited access to the Mediterranean, and to those who worked there.³

Still, it should be kept in mind that much is uncertain even nowadays. Good clay could have been transported by ships to places where the local clay was poor. This was perhaps the case of Naucratis. Many still believe that part of Chian vases were produced there. Scientific analyses should not be overestimated; they also have their limits and the composition of at least two clays of the potter (one of them as the tempering) makes the degree of certainty of exact localization of the natural source of the final product in many cases questionable. Though much has been achieved in this field, many issues are still disputable. The number of samples investigated is relatively small, and much is still missing or has to be proved by other approaches.

2. Use of fine pottery in the Black Sea area.

In the Archaic times, drinking sets (consisting usually of six to eight cups, one or two kraters, an amphora and a pitcher) were mainly Ionian, and Attic as of the fourth decade of the 6th c. Corinthian pottery was mainly represented by containers of toiletries, while a smaller number of Ionian and Attic pieces followed. For the colonists the use of fine pottery from the motherland certainly contributed to self-identification in a foreign milieu, but fine pottery was also used -as part of a fashion trend- by their neighbours. It was sold as a market item and not made upon the clients' order, as toreutics and jewellery of rare metals. But even distant producers had some ideas of what might attract their customers in the Black Sea, and the merchants even more so. This explains the griffins, Amazons, and other allusions to Scythian or Thracian mythology and artistic taste on the Kerch vases. The Castulo cups were produced for long-distance transport, being less brittle than other kylikes. The neighbours of the Greeks had little use for toiletry vases (in the western Celtic world they were missing completely). Their main interest was in drinking sets: kraters, drinking cups and amphorae, while the richest Thracians and Scythians used metal vases.

During the 5th and 4th century BC, Attic vases constituted the most common tableware, but still some containers of perfumes and other shapes followed Ionian tradition and make. While the best vases bearing figurative scenes were probably too expensive for small customers outside the main cities, the Black-Glazed and simply decorated pots came, even in small quantities, into many minor locations in the chora of Greek cities and outside in the hinterland. It could be maintained that in many places, such as Pistiros for example, there was an abundance of fine Greek pottery. But on the other hand even in big centres the common wares usually prevailed over fine vases to a great extent. Drinking from nice pots at feasts helped to entertain during commercial and political negotiations among the Greeks, and also with their neighbours. For the colonial Greeks, fine pottery from their motherland helped them to keep their cultural identity. For potters, especially for those in Athens in the 4th century B.C., the Black Sea was an important market. The neighbours of the Greeks preferred drinking sets to other kinds of pottery. Drinking cups used for funeral feasts and libations are common even in graves,⁴ while lekythoi, serving as containers for funerary ointments, are characteristic of Greek graves. There are still only few detailed analyses of use of Greek pottery in individual houses/oikoi.⁵

The analyses of use of Greek fine pottery in other parts of the ancient world show that the finest pottery had some ritual function, though usually being much cheaper than metal vases.⁶ Fine Greek pottery was used at festivals, at holidays and feasts. Pelikai with cups were apparently also vases for libations for the dead. They are common in graves, as are the 'aquarelle' pelikai, made locally for funeral purposes mainly.⁷ Such cases were rare, except for the 'aquarelle' pelikai and some big Italiot vases of the 4th c. B.C. The proportional relations between Black-Glazed and Red-Figured pottery varied, but even in Athens the cheaper variety prevailed.⁸

In the Black Sea Region the picture of pottery distribution confirms that the main periods of intensive trade relations with the Greek cities in western Asia Minor were in late 7th - 6th century BC, and during the Middle and Late Hellenistic periods, while Athens took the most important position in trade with the area in the 5th, 4th and early 3rd century BC. This picture gained from the study of pottery can be confirmed by what we know from historical sources. But still in Roman times the natural close links with the eastern Aegean provinces persisted.

Much has been done in different parts of the Black Sea area, and, though the general overview of the situation will be now more complicated under present conditions than it was in the eighties, much knowledge gained at that time fits well into the present picture.

Pottery is not a specially important element in group self-identification even in our society (dress, hair style, make-up, houses, religion, language etc. are much more important), and it seems that only the first generation of settlers brought more pottery from their metropoleis, if, as at Miletus, there was an important local school of pottery at that time. In Megara and her colonies this was certainly not the case. But still several generations of colonial Greeks showed some inclination to their Ionian tradition notably in cult, architecture and crafts tradition. The terracotta statuettes, connected to cult traditions, serving largely as dedications to divinities, clearly show this,¹¹ as do metal objects to some extent,¹² even those made for the Scythians.¹³ Transport amphorae were not very attractive aesthetically, but some sorts of wine may have been preferred by the clients. What was ordered, like expensive jewellery, had to respect the taste of the client. Whatever was brought by market through several hands was much less influenced by the final customer. In the field of fine pottery, whatever was of good quality and fashionable, was available everywhere.¹⁴

The Black Sea colonies and their neighbours, however, also showed a more general common presence of certain features in the pottery tradition. Even the Megarian colonies do not show much Corinthian pottery, except for containers of perfumes, and the tradition of local potters producing various categories of Ionian banded wares derived from another more general Ionian tradition in taste and dining customs.

Terracotta types kept Ionian traditions until the end of the 6th century BC, and later they shifted to Attic models; the sculpture and architecture followed the same path, even after some hesitation. The style of Scythian first class toreutics left Ionian artistic tradition and moved under Attic influence in the 5th century BC.¹⁵ Thus the pottery fashions followed in general terms those of other arts; the general cultural orientation was respected, though in many cases less pregnantly, as other artistic objects were considered more important for the cultural identity of those who ordered and bought them, as well as for the local producers.

It is hoped that Black Sea studies will be able to move safely between Skylla in only listing individual features, and the Charybdis of mere general theories. We all have to attempt to find an answer by induction from individual phenomena, as well as with respect for the laws of deduction from reasonable general space. It is here that individual answers should be sought, without developing premature hypotheses, as these may obscure the access ad fontes, necessary at any stage of study.