Red-Figure Lekythos in Six's Technique

This lekythos—a funerary vessel used for anointing the corpse—is painted in the ephemeral and relatively uncommon Six’s technique of the Late Archaic and Early Classical periods. This style is characterized by the over-application on the surface of the piece of a white or red colored slip through which details are then incised down to the black glaze.

This piece features Pan, the god of shepherds and flocks, playing the double pipe and followed by a goat; he is depicted here as goat-legged Pan (Aigipan). Eros, followed by a rooster, runs toward Pan. The cult of Pan was instituted in Athens in 490 B.C.E. after he was credited with aiding the Athenians in the battle of Marathon. In the aftermath of the Persian wars, images of the god in sculpture and painting began to multiply. This may be the only Classical image which shows him alone with Eros; usually both are shown in the company of Aphrodite.