The other side depicts warriors in 'hedgehog' style helmets. Figures on one side of the vase wear helmets with horns. The knapsacks the warriors carry suggest that they may have to travel long distances to battle. This vase also leads to clues about post-palatial Mycenaean warriors. Similar spearmen are also depicted in eighth century BCE pottery, which introduces a curious 500-year gap in styles. Many scholars observe that the style of the figures and the bull head handles of this thirteenth century BCE vase are very similar to eighth century BCE pottery.

The bull's head handles for long encouraged scholars to date the piece later, in the early seventh century BCE. The warriors are clad in short chitons, breastplates, helmets and greaves they are armed with spears and carry shields.

The broad frieze of armed soldiers on the vase, which is incomplete, suggested the name that Schliemann gave it. It is a krater, a mixing bowl used for the dilution of wine with water, a custom which the ancient Greeks believed to be a sign of civilized behavior. The Warrior Vase, dated to the 12th century BCE, is probably the best-known piece of Late Helladic pottery. The Mycenaean Warrior Vase, found by Heinrich Schliemann on the acropolis of Mycenae, is one of the prominent treasures of the National Archaeological Museum, Athens.

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