DESCRIPTION: Intact. Kyathos in impasto ware from the late Villanovan to early Etruscan period of central Italy. The vessel is rather thickly potted, with an all-over burnished black slip. It rests on a flat plain base that expands rapidly to a broad conical body and changes direction to an inward slope at a carination. The inward sloping shoulder is defined by a mold-made pattern of shallow rouletting, with three small nipple-like projections spaced equilaterally at the carination. A vertical section rises from the shoulder to form the plain rounded rim. A substantial handle with one narrow and one wide opening rises from the shoulder to connect with the rim. The handle is broad and flat in profile on its outer side, changes to an outwardly curved profile as it drops back to the vessel's rim and is decorated with broadly incised horizontal lines, and four rows of very fine rouletting where it joins the rim. There is some earthen encrustation inside and out and a few minor areas of wear to the slip.

PROVENANCE: Property from an English deceased estate.

PUBLISHED: Bonhams, London, ANTIQUITIES, 28 October, 2009, described on page 195.

COMPARISONS: The Protohistory of the Latin Peoples, Ministero per i Beni e le Attivita Culturali Soprintendenza Arceologica de Roma, Electa, 2000, Plate 65, for closely related late 8th - early 7th Century BC examples from the necropolis at Osteria Dell'Osa.