Читать книгу Olympic Victor Monuments and Greek Athletic Art - Walter Woodburn Hyde - Страница 36

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In this chapter we shall confine ourselves almost entirely to the statues of victors represented at rest, discussing those represented in motion chiefly in the next. Most of the oldest statues at Olympia, dating from a time when there were few variations in the sculptural type, must have been represented at rest and in the schema of the so-called “Apollos.” Ever since the discovery of the Apollo of Thera in 1836 (Fig. 9), this genre of sculpture, the most characteristic of the early period, extending from the end of the seventh century B.C. to the time of the gable groups of Aegina, has been carefully studied. Though we now know that the type passed equally well for gods and mortals,818 we still keep the name, because of its familiarity and for the sake of having a common designation. That this type actually represented Olympic victors we have indubitable proof. Pausanias mentions the stone victor statue of the pancratiast Arrhachion, dating from the first half of the sixth century B.C., which stood in the agora of his native town Phigalia. He describes it as archaic in pose, with the feet close together and the arms hanging down the sides to the hips—the typical “Apollo” schema.819 Moreover, this very statue has survived to our time (Fig. 79).820 A study, therefore, of this type of statue will give us an idea of how some of the early statues at Olympia looked.

The “Apollo” statues,821 because of differences in facial expression, have been conveniently divided into two groups: those represented by the examples from Thera, Melos, Volomandra, Tenea, etc., sometimes named the “grinning” group, because the corners of the mouth are turned upwards into the so-called “archaic smile,” and those represented by the examples from Orchomenos, the precinct of Mount Ptoion, and elsewhere, named the “stolid” group, because in them the mouth forms a straight line.822 There are, however, essential differences Fig. 9.—Statue of so-called Apollo of Thera. National Museum, Athens. between the statues of each group. Thus, while some of both groups—e. g., the examples from Melos, Volomandra, and Orchomenos—have square shoulders, most of the others have sloping ones. The type gradually improved, as in each successive attempt the sculptor overcame difficulties, until finally revolutionary changes had taken place in the original form. This improvement is seen in the treatment of the hair, in the modeling of the face and body, and in the proportions of the statues. In a head of a statue from Mount Ptoion823—which is broken off at the neck—we seem to see the sculptor in wood making his first attempt in stone. In the archaic example from Thera824 (Fig. 9) the arms hang straight down close to the sides, as in the statue of Arrhachion, being detached only slightly from the body at the elbows, showing that the artist was afraid that they might break off. In other examples, as in the one from Orchomenos825 (Fig. 10) and one from Mount Ptoion826 (Fig. 11), the space between the arms and the body has become larger, while in the example from Melos827 (Fig. 12) only the hands are glued to the thighs. In the “Apollo” found at Tenea in 1846, and now in Munich828 (Pl. 8A), the arms are free, but the hands are held fast to the body by the retention of small marble bridges between them and the thighs. The final step has been taken in two examples from Mount Ptoion (Fig. 13), in which the arms from the shoulders down are free from the bodies.829 The bridges shown on the photograph in the figure to the left, which connect the forearms with the thighs, are of plaster, being added at the time the statue was set up in Athens.830 The figure to the right is smaller and clearly discloses Aeginetan influence. The audacity of the sculptor in entirely freeing the arms in both examples was rewarded by the arms being broken off. Similarly, in the Strangford Apollo of the British Museum (Fig. 14),831 the arms, which hung loose from the shoulders, are broken away. The larger statue from Mount Ptoion just mentioned also has the arms slightly crooked at the elbows, the forearms being extended at an oblique angle to the body. This represents an intermediate stage between the earlier “Apollos,” in which the arms adhered vertically to the sides of the body (as e. g., in the ones from Orchomenos, Thera, Melos, and Tenea), and the later ones, in which the arms were bent, the forearms being extended at right angles to the body (see Figs. 15 and 19).832

Fig. 10.—Statue of so-called Apollo of Orchomenos. National Museum, Athens.

Fig. 11.—Statue of so-called Apollo, from Mount Ptoion, Bœotia. National Museum, Athens.

Fig. 12.—Statue of so-called Apollo of Melos. National Museum, Athens. The example from Thera shows the archaic method of working in planes parallel to front and side and at right angles to one another, the corners of the square block being merely rounded off. The outlines of muscles are indicated by shallow grooves, which do not affect the flatness of the surface, and there is but little facial expression. We see the chest outlined in some examples from Aktion.833 In the Melian example the rectangular form is modified by cutting away the sides obliquely in arms and body; here there is more expression in the face, and the treatment of the hair and the proportions of the body are more developed. In the example from Orchomenos we see a great improvement in form. Here, as in later Bœotian examples, the original rectangular form of the example from Thera has become round, so that a horizontal cross-section through the waist is almost circular; the muscles of the abdomen are indicated and the skin is naturalistically shown in the back and at the elbows. In later Bœotian examples from Mount Ptoion, which are directly developed from the Orchomenos type,834 the form is lighter and the proportions more graceful. In one example (Fig. 13, left) even the veins are shown. In the example mentioned above as showing Aeginetan influence, and dated about 500 B.C.,835 the muscles are clearly marked, just as in the Strangford example and in the statues from the temple at Aegina, showing that foreign art had been introduced into Bœotia by that time. In the example from Volomandra in Attica,836 we see affinity to the examples from Thera and Melos, but Attic softness in the carving of the shoulders and in the proportions. In the Apollo of Tenea (Pl. 8A), “by far the most beautiful preserved statue of archaic sculpture,”837 a statue most carefully worked, we see a Peloponnesian example of the beginning of the sixth or even of the end of the seventh century B.C. Here the sculptor has shown great care in executing details and in the proportions. The eyes are not flat, but convex, and are wide open as in most of the earlier examples. The downward flow of the lines of the statue is striking, which is caused by the sloping shoulders and the elongated triangular-shaped abdomen. The slimness of the figure, with the contour of bones and muscles, is remarkable at so early a date. The fashioning of the knees is detailed. When we contrast this tall, slim, agile statue with the massively square-built Argive type found at Delphi (Pl. 8B), we find it reasonable to suspect that the Apollo of Tenea is an imported work, coming probably from the islands.838 The two statues of (?) Kleobis and Biton, discovered at Delphi in 1893 and 1894, and inscribed with the name of the sculptor Polymedes of Argos, have added much to our knowledge of early Argive sculpture (Pl. 8B, = Statue A).839 This Polymedes may have been one of the predecessors acknowledged by Eutelidas and Chrysothemis, among the first victor statuaries known to us by name, in the epigram preserved by Pausanias from the base of the monument of Damaretos and his son Theopompos at Olympia.840 The epigram, in any case, implies that the reputation of the Argive school in athletic sculpture was already well established by the end of the sixth century B.C. These massively built statues, dating from the beginning of the sixth century B.C., outline the muscles to a certain extent, even showing the line of the false ribs by incised lines. They display, however, but little detail in modeling, except in the knees, where the artist has tried to indicate the bones and muscles. The features of the large heads are without expression; the large eyes are flat and not convex, as in the example from Tenea, though the Argive artist was, perhaps, later than the Corinthian one, and a long distance removed from the later artist of the Ligourió bronze (Fig. 16), to be discussed later.