# Attic Red-Figure Kylix with the Sack of Troy > Onesimos - c. 500-490 BC > Canonical HTML: https://iconotheca.com/artworks/onesimos/onesimos-kylix-ilioupersis-cerveteri/ > Published by Servola Systems GmbH. Last verified: 2026-11-09 ## Tombstone - **Artist:** Onesimos - **Date:** c. 500-490 BC - **Medium:** Attic red-figure terracotta, wheel-thrown and painted with a fired slip - **Dimensions:** Height c. 19-20.5 cm; diameter c. 46.5-46.6 cm; foot diameter c. 20.5 cm. Published figures vary slightly between the Commons/museum caption and the Beazley Archive/Perseus catalogue record; both are given in the technical section rather than silently reconciled. - **Object type:** Antiquity - **Period:** Greek, Late Archaic (Attic red-figure) - **Current location:** Museo Archeologico Nazionale Cerite (National Archaeological Museum of Cerveteri), housed in the Rocca Ruspoli, Cerveteri, Italy, within the Parco Archeologico di Cerveteri e Tarquinia - **Attribution:** accepted ## Summary A large Attic red-figure kylix of about 500-490 BC, potted by Euphronios and painted by his presumed pupil Onesimos with nine scenes of the Ilioupersis, the sack of Troy, centred on the killing of Priam and the child Astyanax. Dug illegally from the Cerveteri area in the late 1970s or early 1980s, it was sold to the J. Paul Getty Museum in pieces across the 1980s through a chain of dealers built to launder its origin, including Giacomo Medici's network.It was identified as looted through one of the most damning categories of evidence the antiquities trade has produced: a Polaroid photograph, seized from Medici's Geneva Freeport storerooms in 1995, showing a fragment of this exact cup still dirty from the ground. Confronted with that evidence by the Italian archaeologist Daniela Rizzo at a 1997 Viterbo conference, and facing further corroboration, the Getty returned the kylix to Italy in February 1999; Medici himself surrendered three more matching fragments two months later.The cup is not the archive's other Euphronios-connected object. It is a different vessel, potted rather than painted by Euphronios, recovered and returned through an unrelated process, and now displayed at Cerveteri's Rocca Ruspoli rather than at the museum that holds the krater under a different chain of title. ## Provenance Every link carries a grade. `documented` means a cited source supports it, `disputed` means the identification is argued but not established, `unknown` means we have no owner for that span and have not bridged it. - **c. 500-490 BC** Unrecorded original owner or dedicant `[documented]` (manufacture, and argued later re-dedication) Potted by Euphronios and painted by Onesimos in Athens (documented by signature and by connoisseurship respectively). A later Etruscan hand added a dedicatory inscription to Hercle under the foot; Rizzo argues this points to a period of use at a sanctuary in the Sant'Antonio sacred area at Cerveteri. That specific placement is argued, not documented. - **unknown ancient date-late 1970s/early 1980s** Unrecorded tomb or sanctuary context near Cerveteri `[unknown]` (burial or deposition, followed by clandestine excavation) No excavation permit, archaeologist's report or tomb inventory has surfaced in the sources consulted. Two different location clues exist (Sant'Antonio sanctuary per the inscription argument; Monte Abatone per Marion True's 1992 letter) and are not reconciled by the available sources. - **late 1970s/early 1980s-1983-1989** Giacomo Medici's trafficking network, including the Hydra Gallery (Christian Boursaud), Frieda Tchacos-Nussberger's Galerie Nefer (Zurich), Nino Savoca (Munich), and a claimed S. Schweitzer collection (Arlesheim) `[documented]` (trafficking and sale in fragments, with fabricated or laundered provenance) Established through the Italian investigation of Medici (1995 raid, 1997 arrest, later conviction) and through Watson and Todeschini's published account, which reproduces Getty acquisition paperwork citing these names. - **1983-1989** J. Paul Getty Museum, Malibu `[documented]` (piecemeal acquisition across at least five separate purchases, accessioned as 83.AE.362, 84.AE.80 and 86.AE.385) The tondo group cost 180,000 dollars (from Tchacos); a further group cost 100,000 dollars (from the Hydra Gallery, 1985). No total price across all purchases is documented in the sources consulted. - **October 1997-1999** Disputed between the Getty and the Italian state `[documented]` (identification and negotiation for return) Daniela Rizzo presented the case directly to Marion True at the Antichita Senza Provenienza conference, Viterbo, October 1997, backed by a Polaroid of dirty, unrestored fragments seized from Medici's Geneva storerooms in 1995 and by a physical fracture match. - **5 February 1999-April 1999** Republic of Italy `[documented]` (return of the assembled cup by the Getty, followed by Medici's voluntary surrender of three further matching fragments) The Getty's formal return, 5 February 1999, was one of three objects returned in that round. Medici surrendered three additional fragments in April 1999 that matched the Polaroid image, an act he attributed to love of country. - **1999-2014** Museo Nazionale Etrusco di Villa Giulia, Rome `[documented]` (display) The cup was exhibited in Rome for fifteen years before its transfer to Cerveteri. - **8 May 2014-20 July 2014** Temporary loan to the Museo Archeologico Nazionale Cerite, Cerveteri `[documented]` (temporary exhibition tied to the tenth anniversary of Banditaccia's UNESCO World Heritage listing) Exhibition title reported as 'Euphronios' Cup: A World Heritage'. - **2015-present** Museo Archeologico Nazionale Cerite, Rocca Ruspoli, Cerveteri `[documented]` (permanent transfer and display) Displayed alongside the Euphronios Krater, a separate object with an unrelated recovery history, since 2015. ## Open questions - Is the findspot a documented tomb, or an inference stitched together from two different clues? Rizzo's argument from the Hercle inscription points to the Sant'Antonio sanctuary area; Marion True's 1992 letter names Monte Abatone, a necropolis. The sources consulted do not resolve whether both are correct, one is mistaken, or the two names were used loosely as shorthand for the general Cerveteri excavation zone. - Is every fragment in the current reassembly ancient and original to this cup? Press accounts refer in passing to further fragments returned in 2005 and to one reportedly seized at Cerveteri in 2008; this record could not confirm either claim against a primary source and has left both out of the formal provenance chain. - What did the Getty pay for the complete cup? Only individual fragment-group prices are documented (180,000 dollars for the Tchacos tondo group, 100,000 dollars for the 1985 Hydra Gallery group); no total acquisition cost across all five to six purchases (1983-1989) appears in the sources consulted. - Was Marion True's January 1992 letter to Medici, acknowledging the Cerveteri and Monte Abatone origin, ever put to her directly during her 2005-2010 trial, and if so, how did she respond? The sources consulted describe the letter's content and its later publication but not a courtroom exchange about it. - What became of the S. Schweitzer collection and Zbinden collection names invoked in the Getty's original acquisition paperwork? The sources consulted describe them as suspected fabrications used to launder provenance but do not report a formal finding establishing that as fact. - Is there a full published catalogue of the reassembled cup, with every joined fragment illustrated, produced since its 2015 move to Cerveteri, comparable to Williams's 1991 Getty publication of the piece as it then stood? ## Sources - [1] Trafficking Culture, 'J. Paul Getty Museum Returns to Italy (1999)', case study. - [2] Trafficking Culture, 'Giacomo Medici', case study. - [3] Trafficking Culture, 'Marion True', case study. - [4] The Art Newspaper, 'Getty returns three stolen works to Italy', 1 March 1999. - [5] Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini, The Medici Conspiracy: The Illicit Journey of Looted Antiquities - From Italy's Tomb Raiders to the World's Greatest Museums, chapter 'The Getty - The Museum of the Tombaroli'. Standard investigative account of the affair, not a court judgment; treated as such throughout this record. - [6] Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini, The Medici Conspiracy, chapter 'Forensic Archaeology in the Freeport', on the 1995 Geneva raid and the Polaroid archive. - [7] Peter Watson and Cecilia Todeschini, The Medici Conspiracy, chapter 'The Paper Trail, the Polaroids, and the Cordata', on Maurizio Pellegrini's reconstruction of the photographic sequences. - [8] ANSA, 'Euphronios' kylix on show after return from Getty', 8 May 2014. - [9] Terzo Binario News, 'Cerveteri, il grande ritorno della Kylix di Euphronios'. - [10] The Journal of Cultural Heritage Crime, 'Il recupero della kylix di Euphronios e Onesimos', 20 November 2023. - [11] Michael J. Anderson, 'Onesimos and the Interpretation of Ilioupersis Iconography', The Journal of Hellenic Studies, vol. 115 (1995), pp. 130-135. - [12] Dyfri Williams, 'Onesimos and the Getty Iliupersis', in Marion True (ed.), Greek Vases in the J. Paul Getty Museum, vol. 5, Occasional Papers on Antiquities 7 (Malibu: J. Paul Getty Museum, 1991). - [13] Classical Art Research Centre / Beazley Archive Pottery Database, catalogue record for the cup (Beazley no. 13363; Villa Giulia inv. 121110; former Getty 83.AE.362 etc.), cross-checked against the Perseus Project mirror. - [14] Wikipedia, 'Marion True'. Tertiary source; flagged for replacement with the Italian court record and the Getty's own institutional statements. - [15] Wikipedia, 'Giacomo Medici (art dealer)'. Tertiary source; flagged for replacement with the Rome Tribunal's sentencing documents. - [16] Wikipedia, 'National Archaeological Museum of Cerveteri'. Tertiary source; flagged for replacement with the Parco Archeologico di Cerveteri e Tarquinia's own institutional record. - [17] Wikipedia, 'Onesimos (vase painter)'. Tertiary source; flagged for replacement with Beazley/ARV scholarship and Williams 1991. - [18] The J. Paul Getty Museum, online collection record for the Attic Red-Figure Kylix, accession 83.AE.362 with joining fragment groups 84.AE.80 and 86.AE.385. - [19] Wikimedia Commons, File:Kylix di Eufronio - Cerveteri.jpg, file description and API metadata (licence, uploader, dimensions given in caption). - [20] Wikimedia Commons, Category:Kylix di Eufronio, detail photographs credited to the contributor Sailko, licensed CC BY 3.0. - [21] Wikimedia Commons, File:Kleophrades Painter - ARV 189 74 - Ilioupersis - Napoli MAN 2422 - 01.jpg, credited to the contributor ArchaiOptix, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. --- Images on this record are public domain or CC0 and are hosted by us. No image on this site is generated or simulated. 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