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
Hartwig has published a bronze statuette from Capua,[1491] now in
the Imperial collection at Vienna, representing a nude youth with a
crested helmet on his head. There is no trace of a shield, but the
helmet and the similarity of the pose to that of the Tuebingen bronze
make it probable that this statuette also represents a hoplitodrome
starting. The so-called _Diomedes_ of Myronian style in the Palazzo
Valentini, Rome,[1492] whose stooping posture recalls the _Diskobolos_
and accordingly has been interpreted as one by Matz and von Duhn, more
probably also represents a hoplite-runner, as Furtwaengler maintained,
because of the similarity of its pose to that of the Tux bronze and
because of its helmeted head.[1493]
[Illustration: FIG. 43.—Statue of the so-called _Borghese Warrior_.
Louvre, Paris.]
Some other attempts to see hoplite runners in existing works of
sculpture have not been so successful. Thus Rayet’s attempt to
resuscitate the old interpretation of Quatremère de Quincy, who had
explained the statue of the so-called _Borghese Warrior_ by Agasias of
Ephesos (Fig. 43) as that of a hoplitodrome just before reaching the
goal, has been recently revived again by Six.[1494] This famous marble
statue of the Louvre, belonging to late Greek art, is an example of the
last development in the Argive-Sikyonian school, which for centuries
had been devoted to athletic sculpture.[1495] Since the statue has
no helmet, there seems to be no valid reason for not adhering to the
usual interpretation, according to which it represents a warrior—by
restoring the lost right arm and hand with a sword—who is defending
himself against a foe above him, conceived of as seated upon a horse.
The attitude and the upward gaze are certainly not those of a runner.
Though Collignon, following Visconti, believes the figure to be one
of a group, the man actually defending himself against a horseman and
covering himself with his shield as he looks up, it is doubtful whether
a second figure ever existed. The artist seems to have contented
himself with representing, not a fight, but only a fighting pose. We
are beginning to understand that the Greek sculptor left something to
the imagination of the beholder.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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