Exekias amphora with Achilles and Ajax

Exekias signed this amphora as both potter and painter. Made in Athens around 540–530 BC, it was found at Vulci in Etruria. The vessel connects an Athenian workshop with the Etruscan city where it was eventually recovered. One side shows Achilles and Ajax, warriors from Greek stories about the Trojan War, seated at a game. Inscriptions identify them. Words beside their mouths give their scores as four and three. Their bent heads and tall spears frame the small playing area, while engraved lines define the decoration of their clothing against the black-painted figures. The other side depicts the family of the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux. The painter used both sides of the vessel to present named figures and their actions. The Candelori brothers donated the amphora to Pope Gregory XVI in 1834. It entered the papal collections shortly before the opening of the Gregorian Etruscan Museum in 1837, where Greek pottery forms part of the account of ancient Etruria.