Читать книгу Olympic Victor Monuments and Greek Athletic Art - Walter Woodburn Hyde - Страница 43

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Owing to the Persian sack of the Athenian Akropolis in 480 and 479 B.C., and the subsequent burial of works of art there and their rediscovery by the excavations of 1885–1889, we know more of archaic Attic sculpture (600–480 B.C.) than of any other early school.969 We have already mentioned certain Attic works which show the influence of the severer Argive school—la petite boudeuse, the head of the yellow-haired ephebe (Fig. 18), the Akropolis athlete statue (Fig. 17), etc.—which was prominent at the beginning of the fifth century B.C., works which can be attributed to Hegias, Kritios, and their associates. They illustrate the reaction against Ionic taste, an influence which came from Asia Minor and the islands, especially after the fall of the Lydian Empire of Crœsus, and which for a time submerged native Attic art. This Ionic art was characterized by great technical ability, and by rich draperies and decorative effect. The archaic smile was its special feature. Ionism is best represented by some of the Akropolis Korai.970 In athletic art we see Ionism at its flood tide in the Rampin head found in Athens in 1877, now in the Louvre, which corresponds in style with some of the earlier female statues of the Akropolis.971 This head has a more elaborate frisure than any of the female heads and, in fact, the elaborate treatment of the hair of the crown and forehead is more suitable to a female than a male statue. The beard is carefully plaited, while traces of red seem to show that the mustache was painted on. Similar traces of color appear on the beard and hair. The smiling mouth, high ears, and almond eyes recall many archaic works, but especially the Apollo of Tenea (Pl. 8A). The garland of oak leaves above the frisure of the forehead may suggest a victor,972 or perhaps a priest or assistant on some religious embassy.973 The turning of the neck—as in the ephebe statue of the Akropolis (Fig. 17)—shows a break at this early time with archaism. Another work illustrating Ionism is the fragment of a grave-stele found near the Dipylon gate in 1873 and dating from the second half of the sixth century B.C.974 It represents the head of an athlete in profile, the youth holding a diskos in his left hand, so placed that his head is projected upon it in relief as on a nimbus. The top of the head is broken off, but we see the usual archaic features in the face—the almond-shaped eye (in profile), big nose with knob-like nostrils, thick lips with the archaic smile, retreating chin and forehead, and high ear with a huge lobe. The neck and chin, however, are full of grace and strength, as is also the slender thumb outlined against the diskos. As the stele broadens downward,975 the figure appears to have been represented with the feet apart, and so may have represented a palæstra diskobolos on parade,976 and is, therefore, our earliest representation of such an athlete. A similar dress-parade pose is seen on the stele of Aristion in the National Museum at Athens, the work of the sculptor Aristokles, which represents a warrior with a spear in the left hand.977 Another torso of an ephebe in the Akropolis Museum represents Ionic work from Paros.978 Another head, the so-called Rayet head in the Jakobsen collection in Copenhagen, one of the most remarkable specimens of Greek archaic art979 (Fig. 22), somewhat later in date than the Rampin head, represents quite a different tendency in Attic art. While the Rampin head represents Ionic influence, this head represents pure Attic work untrammeled by foreign influence, a true development of the old Attic sculpture in poros, Fig. 22.—Archaic Marble Head of a Youth. Jakobsen Collection, Ny-Carlsberg Museum, Copenhagen. the best examples of which are to be found in the decorative sculptures of the Old Temple of Athena on the Akropolis, enlarged by the Peisistratidai. Comparing it with the head of the Athena of the gable of that temple,980 we see great similarity in the simple execution and reserve in the treatment of details—characteristics of pure Attic sculpture—especially in the deep lines on either side of the mouth in the Jakobsen head. The hair is pictorially treated like a cap, traces of red appearing on it as well as on the lips and eyes. The Copenhagen and Rampin heads, together with the famous portrait head in the old Sabouroff collection,981 and the head of a woman in the Louvre,982 form our best examples of old Attic art outside of the museums of Athens.983 The swollen ears of the Jakobsen head show that it is from the funerary statue of a victor, perhaps a boxer. Furtwaengler wrongly classed it as a portrait head.984 A much discussed Attic work is the archaic relief of a charioteer in the Akropolis Museum (Fig. 63).985 This was formerly thought (e. g., by Schrader) to be a block from the later Ionic frieze of the old Hekatompedon which many believe survived the Persian sack, but it is more likely a part of a frieze belonging to a small shrine or altar. It represents a draped person entering a two-horse chariot with the left foot, the hands outstretched to hold the reins, the head and body leaning forward. Because of the krobylos treatment of the hair, fitted for both sexes, and the long flowing robe, the sex has been needlessly doubted, some calling it an Apollo or a mortal charioteer, others an Athena or a Nike, even though the line of the breast, so far as it is visible, shows no fullness, and the long chiton is common in representations of male charioteers.986 However, for the appreciation of the relief it is of no consequence whether the figure is male or female. It may be merely a dedicatory offering of a Panathenaic victor in chariot racing, very possibly assimilated to the type of Apollo,987 as the god often appears in vase-paintings of the same period in similar costume mounting a chariot.988 We shall discuss its interpretation more fully later on.989 While Ionism was prone to represent richly draped figures which concealed the form of the body, we see in this relief, with its fine modeling, a suggestion of the form beneath the folds of the garment, and so, perhaps, only another example of an Attic master rebelling against alien influence.990

At Olympia we have no names of Athenian sculptors prior to the Persian war period. Kalamis helped Onatas with the monument of King Hiero already mentioned. Mikon made a statue of a pancratiast, Kallias of Athens, who won in Ol. 77 ( = 472 B.C.).991 The great Myron, of whom we shall speak at length in the next chapter, made five statues of victors, which were erected between Ols. 77 and 84 ( = 472 and 444 B.C.).992 Only four later Athenian artists are mentioned: Silanion of the fourth century, who made statues for three victors, whose victories ranged from Ols. 102 to 114 ( = 372 to 324 B.C.);993 Polykles the Elder, who made the statue of the boy pancratiast Amyntas of Eresos, who won in Ol. (?) 146 ( = 196 B.C.);994 Timarchides and Timokles, the sons of Polykles, who in common made the statue of the boxer Agesarchos of Tritaia in Achaia, who won in Ol. (?) 143 ( = 208 B.C.)995