DESCRIPTION: A large wheel made jug in Cypriot White Painted IV Ware with "free field" decoration. The vessel rests on a flat base and expands to a wide belly before narrowing below the neck. The handle, flat in section, rises from the shoulder to the back of the trefoil lip. A thin white slip covers the entire vessel; in places it is nearly worn away. The decoration, entirely in dark brown, consists of nine saltire crosses, in three groups arranged around the upper body and shoulder, a large upward looping animal tail below the handle, vertical and horizontal lines on the handle, and bands circling the top and bottom of the neck and along the rim. "Eyes", consisting of a circle with a dot in the center, adorn both sides of the rim. Wheel marks are evident on the body. Intact.

PROVENANCE: Formerly in the collection of Lord Dayton of Corran, the collection formed between 1960 and 2000.

PUBLISHED: Bonhams auction catalogue, ANTIQUITIES, 27 April 2006, London, Page 161, Lot #314, illustrated in black and white.

COMPARISONS: Vassos Karageorghis, Ancient Art from Cyprus, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2000, pages 93-101 for a discussion and examples of Cypro-Archaic jugs with "free field" decoration in both White Painted IV Ware and Bichrome IV Ware.