A 2,600-year-old wine cup on display at the Lamia Archaeological museum was origianlly thought to depict a random assortment of animals, but study researchers now suggest that the display is actually one of the earliest Greek depictions of the constellations. Study researchers state that the design of the ancient pottery, called a skyphos, may hold clues to what the early Greeks knew about astronomy.

“If we go back and re-evaluate other animal scenes that might have been originally categorized as hunting scenes or animal friezes then maybe we can find more depictions and get a greater understanding of how the ancient Greeks viewed the night sky,” researcher John Barnes, a classical archaeology doctoral candidate at the University of Missouri told Live Science magazine.

Mr. Barnes came across the skyphos while on a visit to the museum. The grouping of animals on the wine cup jumped out at the archaeologist who also has a love for astronomy.

One-third of the wine cup discovered in a trench next to a temple in the acropolis of Halai, is missing however the images of the back half of a bull, a snake, a hare or small dog, a large dog, a scorpion, a dolphin and the front half of a panther or a lion have been preserved. Mr. Barnes believes that the decorative images may have been arranged into seasonal groups.