Corinthian Dinos vs. Eleusis Amphora

       Although the Corinthian Dinos and the Eleusis Amphora are from the Orientalizing time period, they differ in function, narrative and color, due to the differences in their respected locations. While the Corinthians were concerned with silhouetted animal-style forms that focused on patterns, the Athenians were developing a pro-attic style that portrayed narratives represented by mythological story telling.

       For the Greeks the Orientalizing period was a time where renewed contact and trades with different civilizations around the Mediterranean prospered. This was key and pivotal to the Corinthian style that was developing after being in isolation during the dark ages and the Geometric period.  The Corinthians and the Athenians spoke the same language (although dialects can vary), which was a potentially unifying factor and similarity in their causes.

      The different locations played an important role in the diversity between the two vases.  Most obviously they function differently. The Corinthian Dinos functions as a krater, and is much smaller in scale than the Eleusis Amphora which functioned as a grave marker.  Corinthian clay was white, and produced vases that were cooler and creamier in color.  The Athenians had mastered the       Corinthian style and took it a step further by using a reddish-orange clay for their vases.  The Pro-attic style originated in Athens, but the Corinthian style was a precursor to its development. Pro-Attic vases were leaning towards the Black-Figure technique. Athenians liked the color of the reddish-orange clay. They also adopted their subject matter to be mythological narratives.  Specifically, the Eleusis Amphora narrates the heroic story of Oddysseus and his companions killing a cyclops by stabling it in its eye. This represents victory, in a rather large register, on the neck of the Amphora.  The clay is still not completely red, like the archaic period, yet it stands as a stepping stone from the creamy white Corinthian style to the precursor of the archaic period.

       The Corinthians Dinos has no narrative or story line. It is a parade of animals. Corinth produces a more natural and fluid style, full of curves, elaborate outlines and smooth contours that flow.  Corinth was heavily influenced by Asia Minor and Egypt, and it is apparent by the side profiles of the animals that look almost sphynx-like.  There are no humans on the Corinthian Dinos.

      Both vases use fillers of geometric patterns to fill empty and void spaces, which perhaps is remaining from geometric traditions.