No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
A new Vase of the Dipylon Class
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
Extract
Among the vases of the Dipylon class the most striking examples are those on which we see represented funeral ceremonies—a hearse or a bier with bands of mourners. And in fact the whole of the subjects on these vases seem to refer directly or indirectly to deceased persons. The chariots may illustrate some feature of the obsequies or may indicate the status of the deceased, while as to the ships, which are not infrequent, they also may represent status or occupation. So it is argued, and at all events the picture on these vases appears always to be of the nature of genre, not of legend.
In publishing a new lebes of the Dipylon kind (Pl. VIII.), recently acquired by the Museum, I may note that its provenance (near Thebes in Boeotia), makes against the view of Helbig and others that the ships on those vases are meant to show that the deceased persons on whose tombs the vases were placed belonged to the order of Attic ναύκραροι. We may assume that the purpose of the vase-painter in those primitive times was to produce to the best of his ability an impressive picture of a funeral ceremony as he saw it on occasions of special grandeur and to sell his vase to any buyer, whatever his status or occupation.
But where in funeral ceremonies do the ships come in? I suppose at the games held in honour of the deceased, such as those of the Aeneid (V. 114–235) which began with a race of ships.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1899
References
page 198 note 1 Athen. Mitlheil. 1893, p. 152, it is argued that the ships on these vases may be compared to the horse on Athenian reliefs as indicating the status of a man. This view, originally suggested by Wilamowitz, was expanded by Helbig in the Mémoires de l'Acad. des Inscript, xxxvi. partie (1898). Previously the ships on the Dipylon vases had been fully discussed by Kroker, in the Jahrbuch, 1886Google Scholar, but more from the point of view of construction and date. As regards ships from Boeotia, Helbig (loc. cit. p. 15, note 1) recognizes a ship of the Dipylon type on a bronze diadem from a tomb at Thebes, but the finest example of the kind is the ship on a bronze fibula from near Thebes, lately acquired by the British Museum(Catalogue of Bronzes, Fig. 85). I may add that at Tipha, a coast town of Boeotia (Pausanias, ix. 32, 3) the people boasted of their skill in sea-matters, tracing their name to Tiphys, the steersman of the Argo.
page 198 note 2 Ed. Reiske, ii. p. 107. ἐγένετο δὲ καὶ ἄμιλλα κηὶ ᾿ Αργὼ ἐνίκα I have to thank Mr. Cecil Torr for this and several other references.
page 199 note 1 Odyssey, iii. 285, ὄφρ᾿ ἔταρον θάπτοι καὶ ἐπὶ κτέρεα κτερίσειεν which Pausanias (x. 25, 2) interprets, ἴνα μιήματος καὶ ὄσα ἐπὶ νεκροῖς ἄλλα ἀξιώσειε τὸν Φρόντιν In Odyssey, xi. 75 the shade of Elpenor implores Ulysses to raise a mound for him by the sea-shore, and to place on it an oar to show for the coming time what manner of man he had been.
page 199 note 2 Lysias, , Apol. Ando. 4Google Scholar, νενίκηκα δὲ τριήρει μὲν ἀμιλλώμενος ἐπὶ Σουνίῳ The ship-races of the Panathenaic games were held at the Piraeus, Plutarch, , Themistocles, 32Google Scholar, and fragment of inscription, C.I.A. ii. 965, frag. b.
page 199 note 3 Mon. dell' Inst. ix. Pl. 39, Fig. 2.
page 199 note 4 Annali dell' Inst. 1872, Tav. ď Agg. 1, Fig. 2. In the one the driver is nude; in the other he wears a helmet and a shield of the Boeotian type.
page 200 note 1 Found on the Acropolis. A similar fragment is in the possession of Dr. Sturge, as I learn from Mr. Cecil Torr.
page 200 note 2 Cf. Journ. Hellen. Stud., 1898, p. 133 for this method of ‘shaking hands.’
page 201 note 1 Bergk, Poet. Lyr. Gr. 4th ed., p. 478, υηκέτι γράψης ὔφιν τριηρευς ἐν πολυζύγῳ τοίχῳ ἀἐ ἐμβόλου φεύγοντα πρὸς κυβερνήτην