<P> In the same room is kept a small lekythos with a plastic decoration, depicting a winged dancer . The figure wears a Persian head cover and an oriental dress, indicating that already in that period oriental dancers, possibly slaves, had become quite fashionable . The figure is also covered with a white colour . The total height of the vase is 18 centimeters and it dates to the 4th century BC . </P> <P> The Hellenistic period, ushered in by the conquests of Alexander the Great, saw the virtual disappearance of black and red - figure pottery yet also the emergence of new styles such as West Slope Ware in the east, the Centuripe Ware in Sicily, and the Gnathia vases to the west . Outside of mainland Greece other regional Greek traditions developed, such as those in Magna Graecia with the various styles in South Italy, including Apulian, Lucanian, Paestan, Campanian, and Sicilian . </P> <P> Inscriptions on Greek pottery are of two kinds; the incised (the earliest of which are contemporary with the beginnings of the Greek alphabet in the 8th century BC), and the painted, which only begin to appear a century later . Both forms are relatively common on painted vases until the Hellenistic period when the practice of inscribing pots seems to die out . They are by far most frequently found on Attic pottery . </P> <P> A number of sub-classes of inscription can be distinguished . Potters and painters occasionally signed their works with epoiesen and egraphsen respectively . Trademarks are found from the start of the 6th century on Corinthian pieces; these may have belonged to an exporting merchant rather than the pottery workfield and this remains a matter of conjecture .) Patrons' names are also sometimes recorded, as are the names of characters and objects depicted . At times we may find a snatch of dialogue to accompany a scene, as in' Dysniketos's horse has won', announces a herald on a Panathenaic amphora (BM, B 144). More puzzling, however, are the kalos and kalee inscriptions, which might have formed part of courtship ritual in Athenian high society, yet are found on a wide variety of vases not necessarily associated with a social setting . Finally there are abecedaria and nonsense inscriptions, though these are largely confined to black - figure pots . </P>

Who studies the changing styles of ancient pottery