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More light on old walls: the Theseus of the Centauromachy in the Theseion*
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
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In 1962 B. B. Shefton shed much light on the iconography of the centauromachy at the feast, and in 1972 J. P. Barron shone more light on the relationship of this iconography to the lost painting of this subject in the Theseion. Barron convincingly argued, from the evidence of early classical vase paintings and the west pediment at Olympia, that the mural painting in the Theseion was the source of this new theme, the misbehaviour of the centaurs at the wedding feast of Peirithoos, and that it was painted between 478 and 470 B.C. He further suggested that the composition was on more than one level, that it showed both the brawl at the banquet and the pitched battle outside, that the centrepiece of the scene was a pair of figures fighting back to back, and that an axe-swinger was present, among other things.
Most of these inferences seem sound, and yet it is as difficult to visualise what the painting looked like as when Robert in 1895 suggested that the fragments of a krater in Berlin reflected the centre of the composition. These fragments seem to fit Barron's criteria as well as anything else, for the composition is on several levels, two heroes fight back to back, the one on the left swings an axe, and at his feet lies the tail of a centaur, which Robert (with more optimism than proof, I think) considered to be a centaur already killed; there is even a hint of the outdoor conflict. Barron does not, however, revive Robert's suggestion—wisely, I believe—nor does he offer another. Nevertheless I think it might be worthwhile to return to the problem of what the centre of this lost mural painting may have looked like and consider why it remains so persistently elusive.
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References
1 Shefton, B. B., ‘Herakles and Theseus on a Red-Figured Louterion’, Hesp. xxxi (1962) pp. 330–68 esp. 338–44, 353–67Google Scholar.
2 Barron, J. P., ‘New Light on Old Walls: The Murals of the Theseion’, JHS xcii (1972) pp. 20–45 esp. 20–33, 44–5Google Scholar.
3 Barron, op. cit. pp. 27–8.
4 Barron, op. cit. p. 33.
5 Berlin F 2403, ARV 2 599.9. Robert, C., Die Marathonschlacht in der Poikile und weiteres über Polygnot, 18 Hall. Winckelmannsprogr. (Halle 1895) pp. 48–9Google Scholar. Robert, repeated this suggestion in Kentaurenkampf und Tragödienscene, 22 Hall. Winckelmannsprogr. (Halle 1898) p. 10Google Scholar.
6 Paus. i. 17.2 (Loeb ed. trans. W. H. S. Jones).
7 The west pediment at Olympia apparently equalises die two heroes, but there the intention was not to celebrate Theseus, as it manifestly was in the Theseion.
8 Shefton, op. cit. pp. 341 ff. and 353 ff.
9 Shefton, op. cit. pp. 360 ff.
10 Barron, op. cit. p. 29 and note 79.
11 Despite Barron's suggestion (op. cit. p. 24) that accuracy in the copying of an anatomical detail may prove accuracy in the copying of the whole composition, I doubt that this is so. Even in such obviously intentionally correct renditions as the copies of the shield of the Athena Parthenos, many liberties are taken and there is a great deal of variation (see Harrison, E. B., ‘The Composition of the Amazonomachy on the Shield of Athena Parthenos’, Hesp. xxxv (1966) pp. 109–33)Google Scholar. In these instances a sculptural model is being reproduced in sculpture, albeit greatly reduced; the adjustments that are necessary are very slight when compared to what is required in the way of modification when one medium is translated into another, that is, when a wall painting is used as the inspiration for a vase painting or for a sculptural group. Here adaptation is unavoidable, for what is suitable in one context is not in another.
12 Barron, op. cit. pp. 26 ff., Webster, T. B. L., Der Niobidmaler (Leipzig 1935) p. 17Google Scholar, Löwy, E., Polygnot (Vienna 1929) pp. 56 ff.Google Scholar (I am grateful to Sir Ernst Gombrich for reminding me of Löwy's stimulating little book.)
13 Paus. v. 10.8 seems to preserve some legacy of this confusion when he identifies the central figure (now generally considered to be Apollo) as Peirithoos, which is certainly wrong. We have no way of knowing whether he was right in identifying Theseus, in this context, as the axe-swinger since when he looked at the pediment he was wholly dependent on what his guide told him. His identification of Theseus in the Theseion is, however, quite another matter. There he could read the inscription by the figure himself.
14 Munich 2640, ARV 2 402.22. The Lapith stands with one foot on his vanquished foe in the traditional pose of the big game hunter—Heracles in the lion metope at Olympia places his foot on his quarry in the same way, but here it is possible that die Lapith is using his foot to give himself leverage as he withdraws his spear from the dead centaur.
16 Harrison, op. cit. (supra n. 11) p. 127. Benndorf, O. and Niemann, G., Das Heroon von Gjölbaschi-Trysa (Vienna 1889) p. 186Google Scholar observed that the arrangement of subjects on the Munich cup (with ‘Theseus who has already killed a centaur’ on the inside and ‘elsewhere the battle is undecided’ on the outside) corresponds to the distinction between Theseus and all the others that is drawn in Pausanias' description of the centauromachy in the Theseion.
16 Barron, op. cit. (supra n. 2) pp. 25–8.
17 See Richter, G. M. A., Attic Red-Figured Vasts: A Survey (New Haven 1958) p. 87Google Scholar, for a discussion of the Foundry Painter's work in the context of the vase painters of the first quarter of the fifth century.
18 Thompson, H. A., ‘The Sculptural Adornment of the Hephaisteion’ AJA lxvi (1962) pp. 345–7Google Scholar and Morgan, C. H., ‘The Sculptures of the Hephaisteion II: The Friezes’; Hesp. xxxi (1962) p. 226Google Scholar and see plates 78b, 81a, and esp. 82 for a comparison between the two images of Theseus on the two friezes and the Tyrannicides.
19 Thompson, op. cit. (supra n. 18) p. 347.
20 If the prototype of the Foundry Painter's cup was a wall painting, it was probably destroyed in the Persian sacks of 480 and 479. This does not mean that the memory of such a powerful image might not have survived. (In a culture where pictorial images are scarcer than in ours, they are remembered better.) We know that the statues of the Tyrannicides carried off by the Persians were replaced in 477/6 by the bronzes by Kritios and Nesiotes, and some similar idea of ‘reconstruction’ of a treasured image might have suggested the modified re-use of the Foundry Painter's prototype in the Centauromachy in the Theseion. See below, p. 164 (discussion of figure I in Plate XV) and note 45.
21 Barron, op. cit. p. 25. Though new in art, the centauromachy at the feast seems to have long been known to literature, cf. Hom., Odyss. xxi 295 ff.Google Scholar
22 Phaedrus 246 and 254. The behaviour of the two horses as described by Plato in Phaedrus 254 is remarkably suggestive of the motives behind the behaviour of the men and the centaurs at the wedding feast: ‘The right-hand horse is upright and cleanly made;… he is a lover of honour and modesty and temperance, and the follower of true glory…. The other is a crooked lumbering animal … the mate of insolence and pride…. Now when the charioteer beholds the vision of love… the obedient steed, then as always under the government of shame, refrains from leaping on the beloved; but the other, heedless of the pricks and the blows of the whip, plunges and runs away …’ (trans. B. Jowett).
23 Shefton, op. cit. pp. 353 ff.
24 Herodotus v 18.
26 Aeschylus' Persians, produced in 472 b.c., shows a similar breadth of vision, for the poet invites the same sort of sympathy for the Persians that the painter fo the centauromachy probably invited for the centaurs. On the nature of centaurs, see also Kirk, G. S., Myth— Its Meaning and Functions in Ancient and Other Cultures (Cambridge 1970) pp. 151 ffGoogle Scholar.
28 Athenaeus viii 347e (trans. C. B. Guliek, Loeb ed.).
27 Barron, op. cit. pp. 28 and 33.
28 Krater, Florence 3997, Painter, Florence, ARV 2541.1Google Scholar.
29 Pfuhl, E., Masterpieces of Greek Drawing and Painting (New York 1955) p. 61Google Scholar.
30 Krater fragment, New York 06.1021.140. Painter of the New York Centauromachy, ARV 2 1408.2.
31 Krater fragments, Berlin F 2403, Niobid Painter, ARV 2 599.9.
32 Krater, New York 07.286.84, Painter of the Woolly Satyrs, , ARV 2613.1Google Scholar and cf. Robertson, M., Greek Painting (Geneva 1959) p. 131Google Scholar.
33 Cf. Shefton, op. cit. pp. 341–2.
31 Shefton, op. cit. p. 359 points out that ‘As host Peirithoos no doubt was more likely than anyone else to have had quick access to a regular weapon, whereas his guests, both Lapiths and centaurs, having reclined unarmed at the banquet were obliged to make do with what came easily to hand, lampstands, logs of firewood, spits, wine-vessels, sacrificial knives, tables and other implements.’ Many vase painters, however, seem not to have felt constrained to adhere to this principle, for on a krater in Vienna (Kunsthistor. Museum 1026, Nekyia Painter, ARV 2 1087.2) two heroes appear equipped with swords, while on the New York fragment (see above, note 30) a youth in the lower register, who certainly is not Peirithoos, wields a sword. See also Shefton, op. cit. p. 259, n. 116.
35 I am using the letters of Treu's reconstruction, a drawing of which can be found in Lullies, R. and Hirmer, M., Greek Sculpture (London 1957) p. 52Google Scholar.
36 I believe the Agora Louterion (Fragment, Athens Agora P 12641, Curti Painter, ARV 2 1043.1) could also be restored in this manner, though Shefton, op. cit. pp. 338–9, n. 38 and pp. 358–60 prefers to follow the scheme of the New York fragment (see above, n. 30).
37 He appears as Treu's figure M on the west pediment of the Temple of Zeus facing to the right and again on the Painter of the Woolly Satyrs' krater (see above, n. 32) facing in the same direction. He is shown facing in die opposite direction in the Berlin fragment (see above, n. 31). Clearly the artists who drew on the centauromachy in the Theseion for their inspiration felt free either to use figures as they appeared in the mural or to reverse them with respect to left and right. The axeswinger, in compositions where the Theseion Theseus has been omitted, may be intended to represent Theseus (cf. Shefton, op. cit. pp. 360 ff. and Robert Kentaurenkampf op. cit. p. 10 and Robert Marathonschlacht op. cit. p. 49); it is with this hero that Pausanias identifies him on the Olympia pediment (v, 10.8).
38 Krater, Geneva MF 238, Geneva Painter, ARV 2 615.1.
39 Louterion fragment, Athens, Agora P 12641, Curti Painter, ARV 2 1043.1.
40 See above, n. 30.
41 See above, n. 31.
42 I have introduced two groups of figures fighting back to back for two reasons; first, die pairs of figures and their opponents as reflected in vases are not always the same, and second, the motif is a useful one for binding groups of combatants togemer and does not look repetitious when the actions and theb adversaries of the heroes are varied. The master of the Olympia pediment (to mention only one example from sculpture) made similar use of balancing groups.
43 Psykter, Villa Giulia 3577, FR I, pl. 15.
44 As in the krater, Florence 3997, Florence painter, ARV 2 541.1; the krater, Vienna Kunsthistor. Museum 1026, Nekyia Painter, ARV 2 1087.2; and on the frieze at Bassae (slab XXVII, British Museum).
45 I have suggested (p. 160) that there was a late archaic wall painting of the outdoor centauromachy from which the Theseion painter drew some of his inspiration. I have also suggested that the group of a Lapith with a dead centaur that the Foundry Painter uses for his tondo on the Munich cup was derived from such a painting. The leaping centaur who first appears in the context of an outdoor centauromachy and then becomes a frequent participant in centauromachies at the feast also seems to have originated in a late archaic wall painting and this strengthens the proposition that such a painting really did exist. It seems likely to me that the Theseion painter used these two motifs from an earlier wall painting in his new work. He may also have drawn other motifs from earlier sources. Certainly the image of the paired heroes fighting back to back which occurs very frequendy in representations of the centauromachy at the feast (see p. 163) is as old as Euphronios' Amazonomachy krater in the Museo Pubblico in Arezzo (see Pfuhl, op. cit. (supra n. 29) fig. 47).
46 See n. 44.
17 See M. Robertson, op. cit. (supra n. 32) pp. 128–9.
48 Barron, op. cit. (supra n. 2) pp. 32–3.
49 See Shefton, op. cit. (supra n. 1) p. 363.
50 National Gallery, London.
51 Ovid Met. XII, 210–535.
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