General Information

Lydian Painted Ware is known primarily from excavations at Sardis, capital of the Iron Age kingdom of Lydia, as well as from other sites, e.g., Daskyleion in Hellespontine Phrygia and Gordion in Greater Phrygia. Lydian pot painters employed an array of decorative techniques, some inspired by schemes devised elsewhere in Anatolia and Greece and Anatolia, and others of their own devising, giving Lydian painted pottery its own refined, lively, and inventive character.

Artisans used paint and slips to create different colors and textures: a slip of primary clay (that is, a clay lacking impurities), which fired a white or cream color; a slip created from the same clay as the body of the vase and containing iron oxide, which fired glossy orange-red to brown (depending on whether the vessel was fired in oxidizing or reducing conditions); and a slip containing manganese, which fired a matte dark purple-chocolate or “black” color. In addition, vessels of the Anatolian tradition might carry a micaceous slip, which produced a golden glittery surface. Grayware is common particularly in earlier levels, and comes in a wide range of shapes. 

Streaky and banded describe two styles that are here combined because painters often used both on the same vessel. To achieve the 'streaky' effect, the painter first applied an overall color wash and then created variations in color, density, and tone by different consistencies of paint and the loading of the brush. On larger vessels, such as water jars, painters sometimes covered one portion of the vessel in a streaky wash and painted bands on another portion. The use of streaked paint is most common in the later seventh and sixth centuries and seems to be a particularly Lydian phenomenon.

Streaky is most common on skyphoi, often those with a reserved band at the rim, on small jugs and on column kraters. The decoration of skyphoi and kraters is occasionally enlivened by the addition of white bands or rows of dots. Both red and black streaky ware was often quite shiny, and the body very hard - both the result of firing at a high temperature. These features often indicate a date in the later sixth century BCE.

In the Achaemenid Persian period, and continuing in the later fourth century BCE, Lydian potters also made “Achaemenid cups,” a shape based on metal versions and ultimately of Iranian origin, which they also regularly covered in streaky glaze.

The "waveline" motif appears most often on amphorae and hydriae. The Lydian versions of these forms are wide-necked and boxy in proportion, with a body width that is close to its height. The decoration comprises wide painted bands, a wavy line around the neck, festoons or two horizontal S loops on the shoulder, and streaky or banded decoration on the lower body.

The clay is typically fine grained light red to orange-red in color (2.5YR 6/8 – 5YR 6/6), compact and highly micaceous, smooth textured and with occasional fine white inclusions, hard and fully fired. Samples tested by INAA affirm consistency of fabric and localize production to Sardis and immediate environs (Dusinberre 1997, p. 58; Dusinberre 2003, p. 189).

Daskyleion (Turkey/Marmara)

Gordion (Turkey/Central)

Sardis (Turkey/Aegean)