Olympic Victor Monuments and Greek Athletic ArtHyde, Walter Woodburn
History
Olympic Victor Monuments and Greek Athletic Art
Hyde, Walter Woodburn
Olympics; Sculpture, Greek; Sports -- Greece
Certain other statues have been mistaken either for libation-pourers
or oil-pourers, when they are really wine-pourers and have nothing
to do with the athletic motives under discussion. A good example is
the marble statue of a _Satyr_ in Dresden,[1093] which represents the
youthful demi-god lifting a can with his right hand, out of which he
is pouring wine into a drinking-horn held in the left. There are many
copies of this work,[1094] a fact which shows that the original bronze
was famous. An attempt has therefore been made to identify it with the
bronze _Satyr_ of Praxiteles mentioned by Pliny as the _Periboëtos_ or
“far-famed,”[1095] which seems to have been grouped with a _Dionysos_
and a figure of _Drunkenness_—a grouping which might fit the Dresden
_Satyr_, since a second figure should be imagined, for which the horn
is being filled. However, it differs stylistically so much from the
_Hermes_ of Olympia that the ascription has been given up, though its
graceful form shows Praxitelean influence and certainly emanates from
the fourth century B. C.
RESTING AFTER THE CONTEST.
[Illustration: PLATE 15
Marble Head of an Athlete, after Kresilas (?). Metropolitan Museum, New
York.]
A very favorite motive was to represent a victor, either standing or
seated, resting after the exertions of the contest (ἀναπαυόμενος).
An excellent example of this motive in a standing posture is the
fourth-century B. C. statue of Attic workmanship found at Porto d’Anzio
and now in the Vatican,[1096] which reproduces the type of the _Apollo
Lykeios_.[1097] Many of the statues, by various sculptors, which
represent the victor standing at rest may be intended to represent him
as resting after the contest. The well-known head of a youth adorned
with the victor’s chaplet, and preserved in four copies in European
museums, appears to come from a statue which represented a victor in
this manner. The best of these copies is in the collection of Lord
Leconfield at Petworth House, Sussex.[1098] We should add a fifth,
a Roman copy of the head, in the Metropolitan Museum, New York (Pl.
15).[1099] In these copies the ears are not swollen, and a certain
refinement and gentleness show that the original was not from the
statue of a boxer or pancratiast, but from that of another type of
athlete, perhaps a pentathlete. Since Pliny mentions the statue of a
_Doryphoros_ by Kresilas,[1100] and because of its supposed Kresilæan
style, Furtwaengler, albeit on slender grounds, has attempted to
identify the original of these heads with that work.[1101] The
expression is certainly one of complete repose. On the crown of the
head, and on the left side over the fillet, is a rectangular broken
surface,[1102] apparently the remnant of a support for the right arm,
which, as Conze thought, proves that the athlete stood with one arm
resting on the head, the hand hanging over the left side. Furtwaengler
admitted that such an attitude might be that of an apoxyomenos,[1103]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account