18. Beehive kalathos lid Figure 31

DP -2S-4. Twenty-seven fragments giving complete lid, chips missing. D. varies from 0.40 to 0.405 m. Lid flat on inner side, outer side has two concentric relief bands, D. of outer band 0.285 m, D. of inner band 0.135 m, around a central boss. Crescent-shaped indentation in edge of lid, 0.04 m across, 0.015 m deep. Four holes piercing lid are set in pairs alongside the outer relief band; pairs are opposite each other, in line with the indentation on the edge, each pair of holes 0.08 m apart. Raised lug, H. 0.016 m, extends along the outer relief band between the two holes nearest the identation; outer relief band on side opposite lug is raised slightly to form a second lug.

The association of lids of this type with combed kalathoi, as no. 20 below, and their interpretation as ceramic beehives have been established in the publication of the Vail house in Attica; see "Vail House" 397-414, 443-52. Cf. also Agora XII, 217-18. Beehive lids and combed kalathos fragments are illustrated in "Vari House" figures 13, 18-21, and plates 75-77, 83-86; known parallels are listed in note 21, p. 398; on the form and function of the lids, see 409, 446. The examples from the Vari house are dated by their context to between the third quarter of the fourth century and the first quarter of the third, pp. 414-18. There seems to be little chronologically significant variation in details of shape and size in beehive kalathoi and their lids between the late fifth century B.C. and the Roman period.