Messapian pottery

Messapian pottery was made by the Messapii, an ancient people inhabiting the heel of Italy since around 1000 BC, who migrated from Crete and Illyria.

From about the beginning of the 5th century BC again under Greek influence, with imports of Attic pottery, figurative decoration was added.

In the fourth century BC, the artists came back again to geometric ornamentation, but by then the ceramics were almost completely under Greek influence.

The most dramatic of all the Messapian pottery forms was the trozzella, which in the local dialect means literally "little wheels".

The Messapian trozzella was a pottery vase which generally had four little wheels at the summit and base of its sharp angled handles.