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The customary classification of Greek painted vases is in five divisions: 1. The earliest style, heretofore described, known as Doric, etc., of which the type is the representation of animals and flowers, usually in friezes or bands on cream-colored or gray pottery (III. 46). 2. Vases of red lustrous pottery on which the figures are painted in black (III. 41). 3. Vases of the same pottery on which the backgrounds are black, the figures being in the red or yellow of the pottery. 4. Vases of the same general style with the last, decorated in florid style, with arabesque and other ornamentations, often introducing Eros (Cupid), and sometimes gilding. 5. Vases with white surfaces, painted with figures, sometimes in outline, sometimes in several colors.

The union of the two colors in pottery, black and red, fully satisfied the Greek lover of the beautiful, and these are the colors of much of the best Greek pottery, in no way relieved as to general effect by the slight use of dull maroon and white. Rare specimens have figures in white on black grounds, and some have polychrome decorations.