Though the foreign influence in this modi fication of Etruscan pottery may have been Asiatic and derived through Phoenician channels, Greek models introduced the inno vation of painted patterns in ferruginous glaze. Greek artistic influence was doubly strong in Italy because the workmen were imported together with their works, either as colonists in the Greek settlements of the south or as adventurers in Etruscan cities. There was, for instance, a considerable manufacture of Protocorinthian ware at Cumae (Naples), founded from Chalcis about 75o B.C., and the local Greek fabric can only be distin guished from imported originals by a slight difference in the clay. But some other pieces found at Cumae reveal their provincial origin in coarser forms and decoration, and still more debased versions found on Etruscan sites are evidently the work of Italian. potters. The Greeks rediscovered Italy at the end of their Geo metric period and the first Etruscan ware painted in the Greek method bears simple rectilinear patterns, not often closely copied from Greek designs, in dull black glaze on light clay. At the same time, and perhaps earlier, there was painted decoration in Etruscan and Latin pottery done in dull white on the dark impasto and bucchero surfaces. A fabric of red bucchero con nected with Falerii frequently bears white linear patterns. Greek and oriental subjects, bands of animals and lotus, were also painted in the same medium, and black bucchero was perhaps more often finished with polychrome ornament than the present condition of the vases indicates, for these colours were badly fixed and are very fugitive. Protocorinthian and Corinthian pot tery were more skilfully copied and to such an extent that the Italian versions of these styles are now as plentiful as Greek originals, particularly jugs with subgeometric patterns, lekythoi and alabastra with polychrome imbricated decoration and those with bands of running dogs. In the black-figure period (6th cen tury) Greek influence was so intense that it is not possible to decide whether some groups, Caeretan hydriai and Pontic am phorae were made in Italy, Ionia or Greece. But ordinary Italian products are easily detected by their inferior style and fabric. As Greek art progressed, Etruscan fell behind, and there can be no confusion between the two fabrics in the red-figure style, though most of the existing Attic vases have been found in Etruria. For this reason they were thought on first discovery to be Etruscan, and the false name still lingers in popular usage. It has also been supposed that Attic vases were made chiefly for the Etruscan market, but the fact is that their better preservation in Italy is due to the Etruscan practice of burying them as funeral furniture in chamber tombs.
Between the later Attic orig inals and their Etruscan imitations stand the great series of red figure vases made in the Greek cities of south Italy, which are derivative rather than imitative, and contain many Italian ele ments. They had a vigorous life for a hundred years after the disappearance of the true Greek industry. Painted pottery had been made by the natives of south Italy since the 8th or 7th century, at first without any traces of Hellenic influence, in fantastic shapes, large askoi and strongly curved and carinated cups with horned handles, elaborately ornamented with geometric patterns (Peucetian ware), and in the 5th century with Greek floral motives in place of the rectilinear designs (Messapian). Some of their peculiar shapes were ultimately incorporated in the red-figure fabrics, but the new style at first was wholly Greek, and its earliest examples are not easily distinguished from Attic vases ; they may, indeed, be the work of Athenian artists living in Italy. But in the 4th century definite local styles were formed.
differing from Attic in certain vase-shapes, colours of clay and paint, types of subjects and styles of drawing. The recognized south Italian fabrics are Lucanian, Campanian and Apulian, with a special group attributed to Paestum. They differ from one another in some technical and stylistic details, but all are marked by dull brownish clays, extravagant shapes and florid ornament. The simplest style is Lucanian, which probably represents an early phase of the industry. Mature Campanian and Apulian are gaily and profusely ornamented, but the effort is generally limited to one face of the pot, the reverse side being filled with dull con ventional figures. Some large vases bear mythological scenes, but ordinary pieces have commonplace subjects of youths and maidens lounging in exaggerated elegance and a close atmosphere of rib bons, flowers, pet animals and domestic furniture. The filling of the backgrounds approaches that of the Greek orientalizing styles. Border patterns, palmettes, waves and foliate wreaths are bold and large. Subsidiary colours, white, yellow, red, were freely applied in dots, lines and washes. Men's costume often reflects Italian fashions, particularly on Campanian vases, a very short tunic with broad belt, and feathered helmets and triangular breast plates for soldiers, presumably the Samnite armour. Dress, pose and gesture of the figures have a histrionic extravagance which seems actually to have been taken from the stage. An important class of subjects consists of theatrical scenes, particularly from the tragedies of Euripides. Burlesques of tragic and heroic legends are also depicted. These were the local phlyakes, the kind of farce that the Tarentines were attending in the theatre when they saw the Roman fleet entering their harbour, in 302 B.C. The stage and scenery are often illustrated in these pictures. Only three artists are known in the Italian schools, and two of them, Assteas and Python, belong to the Paestum group. Both painted theatrical scenes. A krater by Python shows Alcmena on the funeral pyre, Antenor and Amphitryon setting light to it, and in the upper background, by a characteristic and perhaps theatrical conven tion of perspective, half-figures of rain-nymphs pouring water out of pitchers on the fire at the behest of Zeus. The most imposing Apulian vases are great sepulchral amphorae, hydriai and krateres. They bear pictures of elaborate funeral monuments, done in white paint, gabled tombstones or shrines with reliefs or statues of the dead, to whom mourners (in red-figure) bring gifts. An other florid south Italian class of pottery has free plastic orna ment ; large globular askoi, a native shape, have gorgon-masks and fronts of horses on their bodies, large statuettes of women, cupids and winged goddesses standing on rims and handles, all brightly painted in blue and red.
These Graeco-Italian fabrics were succeeded, in the 3rd century, by Hellenistic pottery imitating metal, black glazed ware painted with white, yellow and red necklaces and garlands or moulded in relief. The first class takes the name from Gnathia (Egnazia) in Apulia, where much of it has been found. There was certainly an Italian fabric in this style, for several pieces bear Latin legends, mostly dedications to deities such as Aecetiai pocolom (Aequitiae poculum, the cup of Justice) painted with the foliate decoration. Some of the con temporary relief wares were also made in Italy. Moulded signa tures on several bowls fix their place of origin at Cales in Cam pania and their maker's nationality as Roman : L. Canoleios L. F. fecit Calenos. A similar fabric assigned to Bolsena in Etruria is unglazed, and may have been gilt or silvered.