Photo of the stamp on the
handle of a jar (C-1988-060).

The AMPHORAS Project

Transport Amphoras
(plain clay jars, unglazed)

Amphora bibliography

Amphoras in Greek literature

Translations of Russian publications

Published data on amphora finds

Amphoras in archaeological web sites

AMPHORAS is making available parts of the archive created by Virginia R. Grace at the excavations of the Agora at Athens, as well as some additional materials.

We hope eventually to have the complete list of readings on Knidian amphora stamps, with the KT numbers assigned by V. Grace, available here.

The site contains information about the plain, unglazed, ceramic storage containers with two handles, mostly pointed at the bottom, that were used to carry wine, oil, fish, and other commodities around the ancient Mediterranean. While we have information about many classes of amphora (including Roman, Pamphyllian, Cypriote, Gaza 'baggy' jars, Sinpean etc) our primary focus is on Greek amphoras, the jars made predominanty in Rhodes, Thasos, and Knidos to supply the needs of Athens and the Greek mainland in the Hellenistic period. The amphoras, and especially their stamped handles, collected in the American excavation of the Athenian Agora and at Corinth supply a large part of our data, though the amazing amphora finds collected by Lucas Benaki from building excavations in Alexandria in Egypt, and documented by Virginia Grace, provide a major supplement -- and a corrective -- to our understanding of the ancient wine trade.