In thetypology of ancient Greek pottery, thedinos (pluraldinoi, known in ancient times as alebes) is a mixing bowl orcauldron.Dinos means'drinking cup', but in moderntypology is used for the same shape as alebes, that is, a bowl with a spherical body, often accompanied by awheel-turned stand. It has no handles and no feet. Literary references to such vessels are known from theIliad, and examples have been found from between the seventh and fifth centuries BCE. Ancient artists who painteddinoi include theDinos Painter, theGorgon Painter, theBerlin Painter,Exekias andSophilos.
Adinos was a large, deep bowl, with a round bottom and a wide mouth.Dinoi were used both for cooking and for mixing wine with water.[1] The term is modern; in ancient Greece, the worddinos was used for a drinking-cup,[2] while the termlebes was used for the rounded bowl.[1]
Dinoi were often made withwheel-turned stands, and could be made either in metal or in terracotta: it is likely that the metal examples were designed for cooking, while the ceramic ones were more likely to be used (similarly tokraters) for mixing wine atsymposia.[1][3]Dinoi are known from the seventh to the fifth centuries BCE: the oldest known Athenianblack-figure example isthe name vase of theGorgon Painter,[1] from around 580 BCE.[4] Literary references to them are found in theIliad and the works ofAeschylus andAristophanes.[1]
TheDinos Painter, active in Athens during the second half of the fifth century BCE, takes his name from the type of vase characteristic of his work.[5] Adinos painted and signed bySophilos, made around 580–570 BCE,[6] depicts the wedding ofPeleus andThetis and includes the earliest known depiction of theMuses.[7] Sophilos may have dedicated another of hisdinoi, now in fragments, to the gods on theAcropolis of Athens.[8] Hisdinoi are the earliest known works of ancient Greek pottery to include encircling friezes of humanoid figures.[9]
Exekias also made and signed a black-figuredinos, now in theBritish Museum;[10] anotherdinos is known to have been the work of theBerlin Painter.[11] Thedinos was the main product, slightly ahead of plates, of a school of potters active inAeolis, which flourished in the first quarter of the sixth century BCE. These artists included theLondon Painter, and exported their works toNaucratis in Egypt and to Greek colonies on theBlack Sea.[12]