PELIKE – A vessel for holding wine, olive oil, or grain. In the next stage of development, when pelikai were produced for a specific customer, the vessels also served as an ex-voto and were thus included in richly equipped tombs, as archaeological finds have shown. Although produced by Attic potters and red-figure pottery painters from the fourth century BCE, pelikai have been discovered in archaeological sites in southern Russia and Ukraine, especially in the region around Kerch, Crimea, i.e., the former ancient city of Panticapaeum, which became the capital of the Bosporan Kingdom in the mid-fifth century BCE and was one of the wealthiest ports in the northern Black Sea. By that time, imports of red-figure Attic vases for the demanding “barbarian” aristocracy were booming and practically unrivalled. Although the artistic quality of Attic painted pottery gradually declined in the fourth century BCE to the level of serial production, it continued to dominate the Black Sea market. Greek potters quickly adapted to the taste of their wealthy Bosporan customers, using their distinctive artistic expression and Greek techniques to depict subjects close to Black Sea mythology on exported vases. (DB)