Closely connected, it would seem, with the κοτύλη is the cup known as the σκύφος or σκύπφος, to which there are frequent references in the poets and elsewhere but not in Aristophanes. Homer[645] describes it as a rustic sort of bowl, which held milk; Simonides applies to it the epithet οὐατόεντα, or “handled.” Athenaeus connects the word with σκαφίς, a round wooden vessel which held milk or whey, and this seems to accord with the mention of it in Homer. It was always specially associated with Herakles,[646] who was said to have used it on his expeditions; hence certain varieties were known as σκύφοι Ἡρακλεωτικοί, but it is more probable that this word refers to Heraklea Trachinia in Northern Greece. Besides the Herakleotic, Athenaeus mentions specially Boeotian, Rhodian, and Syracusan skyphi. The ordinary shape of the vase may be inferred from the form of that which Herakles is often depicted holding on the monuments[647]; it is of the same type as the κοτύλη, but the body tapers below and has a higher foot, while the handles are placed lower down and bent upwards. Among the late black-glazed wares with opaque paintings (p. 488) some examples occur of cups with handles twisted in a kind of knot, and it has been suggested that these represent the “Heraklean knot” described by Athenaeus[648] as to be seen on the handles of these: σκύφοι Ἡρακλεωτικοί. The word is also frequently used by Roman authors, and there is a particularly interesting passage in Suetonius (cf. p. 134) alluding to the _Homerici scyphi_ adorned with chased designs from the Homeric poems[649] which Nero possessed; these were, of course, metal bowls with reliefs,[650] but they have their fictile counterparts in the so-called Megarian bowls (p. 499). Athenaeus[651] quotes from the philosopher Poseidonios a passage referring to drinking-cups called Παναθηναικά, which may be supposed to have some connection with the Panathenaic festival, and attempts have been made to identify them with a class of skyphi or kotylae of the R.F. period, the invariable subject on which is an owl between two olive-branches (p. 410).[652] There is no doubt some reference to the Athenian goddess, but it is more likely that they represent some kind of official measure (see above, p. 135). It will be noted that the σκύφος appears to have been originally a wooden vessel used as a milking-pail, and it is further identified in Theocritus with the wooden κισσύβιον, to which we have already alluded. Two other words are given by Athenaeus to denote large wooden bowls of the type of the σκύφος, namely the ἄμφωτις and the πέλλα[653] both used as milking-pails. They were not strictly speaking drinking-cups. Among existing Greek vases this form, viz. a deep straight-sided bowl, such as a carved wooden vessel would naturally take, seems to be best represented by the examples discovered on the site of the Cabeiric temple at Thebes, which are of this shape and of considerable size (see Fig. 98, p. 392).[654]