_Philandridas_ is more dramatic than that of the head from Sparta, its fierce, almost barbarous, look of defiance may well be explained by the fact that here is represented a victor from Akarnania, a country noted among the other Greek states for anything but culture and refinement. THE SPARTA HEAD AN ECLECTIC WORK AND AN EXAMPLE OF ASSIMILATION. It is, then, in consequence of these resemblances to Lysippan work, and because of the differences between it and the Tegean heads, that I am led to see more of Lysippos than of Skopas in this beautiful head from Sparta. An analysis of its style permits us to discover in it the mixed influences of Praxiteles, of Lysippos, and of Skopas. It seems to me necessary, therefore, in view of this mixture of tendencies, to regard it as an eclectic work, in which the unknown artist has combined Lysippan and Praxitelean elements chiefly; and that he was also under the influence of Skopas is evinced by the peculiarities mentioned in the treatment of the eyes and hair;[2167] but even in the modeling of the eyes, I believe that his chief debt was to Lysippos. The fineness of surface modeling, commented on by both Professor Bates and Dr. Caskey, recalls the delicacy of execution in detail which is mentioned by Pliny as characteristic of Lysippan art.[2168] It surely points to a date for the work not much if at all later than the end of the century which was made glorious in the history of sculpture by the labors of these three great masters. In the preceding account I have tacitly assumed with Professor Bates that the head from Sparta represents a beardless Herakles. But, as Dr. Caskey remarks, one might hesitate to accept this identification if it were not for the attribute of the lion’s skin above the forehead, for here there is little indication of the strength so characteristic of later representations of the hero. Dr. Caskey, however, observes that a head of Herakles, now in the British Museum, which some have regarded as an original by Praxiteles, is even more boyish than this one. However, it is very doubtful if the Sparta head should be referred to a statue of Herakles at all. Pausanias mentions only three statues of Herakles in Sparta, to any one of which it seems futile to try to refer the head under discussion; thus in III, 14.6, he speaks of an ἄγαλμα ἀρχαῖον to which the _Sphairians_, _i. e._, lads entering on manhood, sacrificed, as standing on the road to the Δρόμος, outside the city walls; in the same book, 14.8, he says that an image of the hero stood at the end of one of the two bridges across the moat to Plane-tree Grove, _i. e._, the boys’ exercise-ground; and again in this book, 15.3, he says that an ἄγαλμα ὡπλισμένον of Herakles stood in the Herakleion close to the city wall, whose attitude (σχῆμα), was suggested by the battle between the hero and Hippokoön and his sons. The same writer enumerates only three other statues of Herakles in Lakonia.