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
mentioned by Pliny were also wrestlers.
Whether wrestling-groups were set up at Olympia is doubtful.
Chariot-groups were indeed common, but there is no reason why the
victorious wrestler should have had himself coupled with his defeated
opponent. Pausanias, moreover, mentions no such groups. We are
therefore safe in inferring that in most, if not in all, cases the
wrestler would content himself with a single statue, and this might
represent him in any position in which he was not actually interlocked
with his adversary. That such statues represented him both in repose
and in motion is attested by recovered bases. The footprints on the
base of the statue of the Elean wrestler Paianios, a victor of the
early third century B. C.,[1655] shows us that he was represented
as standing in repose, the weight of the body resting on the right
leg, the left being drawn back and touching the ground with the toes
only. A hole in the base may have been for a spear on which the
victor’s hand rested, though the statue is not that of a pentathlete.
The perfectly preserved footprints on the base of the statue of the
boy wrestler Xenokles by Polykleitos the Younger show that he was
represented as standing with his weight on the right leg, the left
being slightly advanced and to one side, though resting flat on the
ground. The head was probably turned a little to the right. Thus the
wrestler was poised ready to grip his adversary.[1656] This statue must
have been a favorite among athlete monuments, since the same motive
appears in various Roman copies, which Furtwaengler assigns to the
immediate circle of the pupils of Polykleitos. The statue of the Argive
wrestler Cheimon by Naukydes may have represented him in motion, since
Pausanias, in mentioning two statues of the victor, one in Olympia and
the other in the temple of Concord at Rome, says that they were among
the most famous works of that sculptor. From this encomium Reisch has
assumed that the one at Olympia was represented in lively motion.[1657]
BOXERS.
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