Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T23:52:01.072Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A New Metope Head from the Parthenon1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 September 2015

Arthur Bernard Cook
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Some years ago at a London sale of antiquities I acquired three marbles described as ‘Graeco-Roman heads.’ Sale Catalogues are sometimes (not often) unduly modest. One of these heads is in fact an Aphrodite of the Petworth type in close-grained lychnítes, and might be assigned to the closing years of the fourth century, though I should prefer to call it shop-work of a somewhat later period. A second head is a fragment broken from a small portrait statue in crystalline island marble presumably from the quarries of Naxos: it once wore a metal diadem pegged into a single drill-hole on the nape of the neck and perhaps represented some Hellenistic prince. But the third head (Pl. I), which forms the main subject of this paper, is of greater moment, for it is—as all who have seen it agree—an Attic original of the mid fifth century, and as such merits the most careful and circumspect investigation.

Of its provenance and history little can be said. It came, like other items sold with it, from a collection formed about 1830 by the grandfather of its late owner. The collector was a wealthy man who had certainly visited Egypt and probably made purchases in Rome. In short, we have the usual story of a well-to-do traveller returning from the Grand Tour with a trunk or two full of Levantine spoils.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 61 , November 1941 , pp. 6 - 13
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1941

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

2 From a photograph by Mr. G. Strickland.

3 Cambridge 1921, ii. 95 f. no. 1309, figs, a, b. Cp Beazley, J. D. and Ashmole, Bernard, Greek Sculpture & Painting Cambridge 1932, p. xi fig. 95Google Scholar.

4 Journ. Hell. Stud. 1894 xiv., 198 ffGoogle Scholar. pl. 5 figs, 1, 2. The nose is modern and regrettable.

5 Richter, Gisela M. A., The Sculpture and Sculptors of the Greeks Yale Univ. Press 1929, pp. 32, 49Google Scholar.

6 See Collignon, M., Histoire de la sculpture grecque Paris 1897, ii. 15 ffGoogle Scholar.

7 Picard, C. in the Manuel d'archéologie grecque: La sculpture Paris 1939, ii. 407 n. 1Google Scholar.

8 Schrader, H. in the Jahresh. d. oest. arch. Inst. 1911 xiv., 58 fig. 61Google Scholar, Praschniker, C., Parthenonstudien Augsburg-Wien 1928, p. 60Google Scholar.

9 Mackenzie, D. in the Ann. Br. Sch. Ath. 1908–1909 xv., 274 ffGoogle Scholar.

10 Cp. Zeus i., 710Google Scholar.

11 Thuc. i. 93.

12 Noack, F. in the Ath. Mitt. 1907 xxxii., 513 ff. pl. 21Google Scholar.

13 The hole is cylindrical with a flat bottom and a slightly chamfered or widened top. It measures 1½ inches in depth and about the same in diameter.

14 Gardner, P. in the JHS 1918 xxxviii., 19 ff.Google Scholar, Picard, C. in the Rev. 1935 i., 124 fGoogle Scholar. (‘Aspasie ou Elpinicé?’).

15 Picard, C. in the Manuel d'archéologie grecque: La sculpture Paris 1939 ii., 51 fig. 24Google Scholar.

16 Reinach, S., Recueil de têtes antiques Paris 1903, p. 23 fig. 5Google Scholar.

17 Hürlimann, , Gotische Kathedralen in Frankreich Zürich-Berlin 1937, pl. 54Google Scholar.

18 MrsStrong, in the JHS 1894 xiv., 200 fGoogle Scholar. fig. 3 acutely compares the treatment of Aphrodite's ear on the central section of the Ludovisi ‘throne.’

19 Herrmann, P., Denkmäler der Malerei des Altertums München 1917, pl. 144Google Scholar, Reinach, S., Répertoire de Peintures Grecques et Romaines Paris 1922, p. 346 no. 5Google Scholar.

20 Omont, H., Athènes au XVIIe siècle: Dessins des sculpture du Parthénon attribués à J. Carrey … Paris 1898, pl. 6 (metopes xvii–xxiv)Google Scholar.

21 For a good conspectus of all the southern metopes see e.g. Murray, A. S., The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1903, pl. 10Google Scholar or Collignon, M., Le Parthénon Paris 1910, pl. 23–24Google Scholar = Fougères, G., L'Acropole d'Athènes: Le Parthénon Paris 1913, pl. 23–24Google Scholar.

22 Pernice, E. in the Jahrb. d. kais. deutsch. arch. Inst. 1895 x., 93Google Scholar.

23 Perrot, G. in Mélanges Henri Weil Paris 1898, p. 378Google Scholar.

24 Smith, A. H., The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1910, pp. 29, 32, 34Google Scholar.

25 Studniczka, F. in the Neue Jahrb. f. kl. Altert. 1912 xxix., 260–264Google Scholar.

26 Picard, C., La Sculpture Antique Paris 1926 ii., 16 ffGoogle Scholar.

27 Picard, C. in the Manuel d'archéologie grecque: La sculpture Paris 1939, i. 403Google Scholar.

28 Murray, A. S., The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1903, p. 54 ffGoogle Scholar.

29 Praschniker, C., Parthenonstudien Augsburg-Wien 1928, p. 87 ffGoogle Scholar.

30 Id.ib. p. 246 n. 2. Schweitzer, B. ‘Prolegomena zur Kunst des Parthenon-Meisters’ in the Jahrb. d. deutsch. arch. Inst. 1938 liii., 1–89, 1939 liv., 1–96Google Scholar speaks throughout of the ‘Parthenon-Meister,’ but his acute and convincing observations point towards the triumphant conclusion that the said ‘Meister’ was Pheidias. I am indebted to Captain T. B. L. Webster for a reminder of these important articles.

31 Plut. v. Per. 13 .

32 Curtius, E. in the Arch. Zeit. 1883 xli. 351 ffGoogle Scholar. pl. 18 (Roscher, Lex. Myth. iii. 1771 f. fig. 2)Google Scholar.

On the British Museum kratér no. F 272, a late vase of ‘Apulian’ style, novelties are attempted. Peirithoös' bride, here named Laodameia, wears a long transparent Ionic chitón; the woman on the left, a Doric péplos with small himátion; the woman on the right, a Doric péplos (Mon. Ann. e Bull. d. Inst. 1854 pl. 16, Lex, Roscher. Myth. iii. 1773 f. fig. 4)Google Scholar.

33 Treu, G. in Olympia Berlin 1894–1897 iii. 77 and 135 (O*)Google Scholar.

34 Murray, A. S.The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1903 p. 58Google Scholar.

35 Smith, A. H.The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1910 p. 33 fig. 57Google Scholar.

36 Lehmann-Hartleben, E. in the Am. Journ. Arch. 1940 xliv., 349 fig. 28Google Scholar.

37 Richter, G. M. A.Ancient Furniture Oxford 1926 p. 95 ff. figs. 236–241Google Scholar.

38 Aristoph., Thesm. 255Google Scholar.

39 Caylus vi. 238 pl. 71, 3 f., Clarac iv pl. 626, 1407, Müller-Wieseler, Denkm. d. alt. Kunst ii. 3 no. 282Google Scholar. See further Bernoulli, J. J.Aphrodite Leipzig 1873 pp. 344–348Google Scholar.

40 Reinach, Rép. Vases ii. 9, 216, 240Google Scholar.

41 Theopomp. com. Ἡδυχάρης frag. 3 ap. schol. Aristoph., Plut. 768Google Scholar. .

42 A point satisfactorily established by Smith, A. H.The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1910 p. 33 fig. 56Google Scholar.

43 Nogara, B.Le nozze Aldobrandine Milano 1907 p. 21 with n. 5 pl. 7Google Scholar.

44 Zeus ii pl. xxxiii, iii pl. lviii, 3.

45 Picard, C. in the Manuel d'archéologie grecque: La sculpture Paris 1939 ii. 404 n. 1Google Scholar.

46 Murray, A. S.The Sculptures of the Parthenon London 1903 p. 55Google Scholar.

47 Smith, A. H.Cat. Sculpt. Brit. Mus. London 1892 i. 280 fGoogle Scholar. nos 523, 524, Reinach, Rép. Reliefs i. 223 nos 2, 3Google Scholar.

48 Pers. sat. 4. 8.

49 Paus. 1. 15. 3, 1. 32. 5.

50 Browning Echetlos.

51 Plut. v. Them. 15.

52 Paus. 10. 32. 4.