FIG. 12. OSTRAKON OF MEGAKLES.
From Jahrbuch d. arch. Inst.
FIG. 13. OSTRAKON OF XANTHIPPOS.
We may recall the fact that it was with a tile that Pyrrhus met his death when besieging Argos. Nor is this the only occasion on which these humble objects have played a part in history. In the well-known Athenian institution of Ostracism the act of voting was performed by writing on fragments of tiles or potsherds the names of those whom it was desired to banish. Recent excavations have yielded more than one actual specimen of these ὄστρακα or sherds,—one bearing the name of Megakles (Fig. [12].); another, part of a painted vase from the pre-Persian débris on the Athenian Acropolis, the name of Xanthippos, the father of Perikles (Fig. [13]); and a third, that of Themistokles.[[359]]
It is also probable that in Greece, as among the Romans, the hollow floors of the hypocausts, as well as the flue-tiles of the hot baths, were made of terracotta. The same material was also used for the pipes, by means of which water was conveyed from aqueducts or drained from the soil. A drain-pipe from Ephesos in the Museum at Sèvres is noted by Brongniart and Riocreux,[[360]] and others have been found at Athens[[361]] and in the Troad.[[362]]
Tiles were also employed for constructing graves, as has already been noted in Chapter II. (see p. [34]). In some tombs the floor was paved with flat tiles, and the roof was constructed of arched tiles forming a vault. The flat and square tiles were not used for tombs until a comparatively late period. Some graves had a second layer of tiles to protect the body from the superincumbent earth.[[363]] We shall have occasion to make further allusion to the use of painted terracotta slabs in Etruscan tombs (Chapter [XVIII.]).
The sarcophagi which played so important a part in the tomb were also frequently made of terracotta, this material being most commonly employed in Etruria. We have already mentioned (p. [62]) the series of archaic painted sarcophagi, which have all come from Clazomenae, near Smyrna, and furnish us with much valuable information on the art of painting in Ionia in the sixth century B.C. They will receive some attention from this point of view in Chapter [VIII]. The British Museum contains two very remarkable examples of Etruscan terracotta sarcophagi, which are described in Chapter [XVIII]., as well as a series of smaller examples, which are mere cinerary urns. Among other examples of terracotta as used in tombs may be mentioned here a series of small reliefs found in tombs at Capua and elsewhere in Southern Italy. They consist of masks of Satyrs, river-gods, and Gorgons, and are often highly coloured in red and blue. They are of late archaic work, about 480 B.C., but the exact way in which they were used to decorate the tombs is uncertain. The British Museum collection contains many specimens of these objects.[[364]]
There is a curious class of objects which hardly come under the heading of any other category, but may be conveniently discussed here. Complete specimens are very rare, but there is one in the Museum at Geneva which has been identified as a brazier (πύραυνος or ἐσχάρα), and more recently as a baking-oven (κλίβανος).[[365]] The form is that of a large basin on a high stand, hollow underneath, with three square solid handles projecting upwards from the rim. These handles, of which over a thousand examples are to be found in various collections, are usually the only part remaining, sometimes with part of the rim attached. They are decorated with heads and other devices, usually in relief on square panels, and the majority of these heads are of a Satyric or grotesque character, wearing conical caps or adorned with ivy-wreaths. They probably represent demons of some kind, and are placed there with superstitious intent, to avert evil influences from whatever was baked or cooked in the vessel. Similar masks are usually seen attached to representations of forges and ovens on the painted vases,[[366]] and remind us of the pseudo-Homeric invocation of evil deities against the potters of Samos (see also p. [213] below). Professor Furtwaengler has identified the heads as those of the Kyklopes, the attendant workmen of Hephaistos.[[367]]
These objects are found all over the Mediterranean, especially at Halikarnassos, Naukratis, and Delos, and the last-named place has been regarded as the centre of their manufacture. They are all of the same brick-like, coarse, red clay. Some bear the name of their maker, Hekataios or Nikolaos. Besides the heads already mentioned, heads of goats or oxen, or of Sirius, thunderbolts and rosettes are used by way of devices. They have been collected together, and illustrations of all the different types given by Conze in the Jahrbuch for 1890, p. 118 ff.: two specimens are given on Plate [IV]. They belong to the Hellenistic Age.