The vases on which these scenes abound belong chiefly to the middle of the century, the period of the “fine style,” as it is called. But, as I have noted before, the actual athletic types have already become somewhat conventional, and we feel that the artist’s interest in them has become secondary. It is rather the variety of the life, with its possibilities of grouping and composition, that appeals to him. At Athens, at least, a change is beginning in the attitude of the people towards athletics. The fine period of vase painting ends about the year 440 B.C., and in the vases of the decline this change is more marked. We still see the palaestra; but it is indicated sketchily by an occasional pair of halteres on the wall; and the youths stand about idly gossiping and arguing, but take no part in manly exercise. This disappearance of athletics from the vases is significant: the sculptor could still work out his own ideals, but the vase painter was dependent for his trade on the popular taste, and the vases are therefore a true index of the feeling of the time. If we compare one of these later vases with such a vase as the Panaetius kylix in Munich (Fig. 17), we cannot help being reminded of the contrast drawn by Aristophanes in the _Clouds_ between the old education of the men who fought at Marathon and the education of his day. The vases enable us to date the change about the year 440, and we shall find other indications that confirm this date. [Illustration: Fig. 17. R.-f. kylix. Munich, 795.]