In classifying the pottery of Ancient Greece

Pottery of Ancient Greece

As the result of its relative durability, pottery is a large part of the archaeological record of Ancient Greece, and because there is so much of it it has exerted a disproportionately large influence on our understanding of Greek society...

, a skyphos is a two-handled deep wine-cup on a low flanged base or none. The handles may be horizontal ear-shaped thumbholds that project from the rim (in both Corinth

Corinth

Corinth is a city and former municipality in Corinthia, Peloponnese, Greece. Since the 2011 local government reform it is part of the municipality Corinth, of which it is the seat and a municipal unit...

ian and Athenian

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

 shapes), or they may be loop handles at the rim or that stand away from the lower part of the body. Skyphoi of the type called glaux (owl) have one horizontal and one vertical thumbhold handle.

Early skyphoi were made during the Geometric period

Geometric Style

Geometric art is a phase of Greek art, characterised largely by geometric motifs in vase painting, that flourished towards the end of the Greek Dark Ages, circa 900 BCE to 700 BCE...

. Corinth set the conventions that Athens followed. Over a long period the shape remained the same while the style of decoration changed.

A Roman

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....

 skyphos of cameo glass

Cameo Glass

Cameo glass is a luxury form of glass art produced by etching and carving through fused layers of differently colored glass to produce designs, usually with white opaque glass figures and motifs on a dark-colored background...

 can be seen at the Getty Museum.

Comparable forms of a handled drinking cup on a base included:

• Kotyle, a more generic term for any cup.
• Kantharos
  Kantharos
  A kantharos or cantharus is a type of Greek pottery used for drinking. It is characterized by its high swung handles which extend above the lip of the pot.The god Dionysus had a kantharos which was never empty....
  
  
• Komast
• Kylix
  Kylix (drinking cup)
  A kylix is a type of wine-drinking glass with a broad relatively shallow body raised on a stem from a foot and usually with two horizontal handles disposed symmetrically...
  
  

The word skyphos has been adopted for the purposes of biological classification with regard to jellyfish

Jellyfish

Jellyfish are free-swimming members of the phylum Cnidaria. Medusa is another word for jellyfish, and refers to any free-swimming jellyfish stages in the phylum Cnidaria...

, which are included in the class Scyphozoa

Scyphozoa

Scyphozoa is a class within the phylum Cnidaria, sometimes referred to as the "true jellyfish".The class name Scyphozoa comes from the Greek word skyphos , denoting a kind of drinking cup and alluding to the cup shape of the organism....

 (literally cup-shaped animal), and Sarcoscypha

Sarcoscypha

Sarcoscypha is a genus of ascomycete fungus in the family Sarcoscyphaceae. Species of Sarcoscypha are present in Europe, North America and tropical Asia. They are characterised by a cup-shaped apothecium which is often brightly coloured. Some members of the family such as S. coccinea and the -...

, the scarlet cup fungus.

External links

• Skyphoi
• Perseus Encyclopedia: skyphos