Part 8

The first instance chronologically recorded by Pausanias of a chariot victor dedicating his statue along with chariot and horses is that of king Gelo of Syracuse, the group being the work of the Aeginetan Glaukias.[1887] The first instance of a victor dedicating his statue in a group with chariot, horses, and charioteer, is that of Kleosthenes of Epidamnos, the group being the work of the Argive Hagelaïdas.[1888] Even the names of the horses were inscribed on this monument.[1889] The owner of the chariot, to be sure, took the prize, but he felt that the victory was due to the horses and driver, and so he associated them with himself in the monument. Sometimes the victor acted as his own charioteer. Thus the Spartan Damonon, already mentioned as the hero of many chariot victories in and near Sparta, tells in the inscription appearing on his votive relief that he was his own charioteer.[1890] In the first _Isthmian Ode_ Pindar congratulates Herodotos of Thebes, who won the chariot-race (?) in 458 B. C., on not entrusting his chariot to strangers, but driving it himself.[1891] Thrasyboulos seems to have driven his father’s car at the victory commemorated by the sixth _Pythian Ode_, sung in honor of the chariot victory of Xenokrates of Akragas in 490 B. C. at Delphi. Karrhotos, the charioteer of Arkesilas of Kyrene already mentioned, was the latter’s brother-in-law.[1892] Similarly Aigyptos appears to have ridden his own horse at Olympia instead of entrusting it to a jockey.[1893] Sophokles, in the _Electra_, has the hero Orestes drive his own chariot at the _Pythia_. Kyniska, the daughter of king Archidamas of Sparta, was the first woman to enter the contests at the race-course and the first to win an Olympic victory with her chariot.[1894] Apart from the small votive offering, already mentioned as standing in the temple of Zeus, she had also a victor-group at Olympia, by the sculptor Apellas, consisting of chariot, horses, charioteer, and herself. The rounded form of the recovered base,[1895] in connection with the description of Pausanias, permits us to assume that the statue of the princess stood in front on the projecting rounded portion of the pedestal. This is the contention of Loewy, who opposes the theory of Furtwaengler[1896] that the statue stood away from the rest of the group, since Pausanias makes no mention of such an arrangement. In any case, the charioteer in the group can not have been separated from the car.

In an unpublished paper by my former teacher, Dr. Alfred Emerson, which was read by Professor D. M. Robinson before the Archæological Institute of America at its Christmas meeting in Providence in 1910, and entitled _The Case of Kyniska_,[1897] the argument was made that the chariot was in miniature; that the statue of Kyniska was a portrait, because of the wording of the recovered epigram; and, lastly that the smallest of the so-called bronze dancers from the villa of the Pisos in Herculaneum, now in Naples, is a late reproduction of the statue at Olympia by Apellas. Emerson thinks that Pliny no doubt often visited the villa and may well have had these statues in mind when he mentioned Apellas as the author of several statues of women adorning themselves.[1898]

The monument erected by Hiero, son of Deinomenes and brother and successor of king Gelo at Syracuse, who won two horse-races and a four-horse chariot victory at Olympia in Ols. 76, 77, 78 (= 476-468 B. C.),[1899] consisted of a bronze chariot, on which the charioteer was mounted, and on either side a race-horse with a jockey on each. Onatas made the chariot (and possibly the statue of the driver), while Kalamis sculptured the horses and jockeys. Such a division among sculptors was not uncommon at Olympia. Thus the Aeginetan artist Simon and the Argive Dionysios made a group in common for Phormis, which we have already mentioned, consisting of two horses and two charioteers.[1900] The Chian Pantias and the Aeginetan Philotimos made a group in common for Xenombrotos of Kos, victor in horse-racing, and for his son, the boy boxer Xenodikos, which consisted of statues of the man and the boy on horseback.[1901] Pliny mentions a four-horse chariot-group for which the elder Praxiteles made the charioteer and Kalamis the chariot, adding that Praxiteles did this out of kindness, not wishing it to be thought that Kalamis had failed in representing the man after succeeding in representing the horses.[1902]

In some of the Olympic chariot-groups doubtless the charioteer was represented at the moment of entering the chariot or already in it. Sometimes a figure of Nike took the place of the charioteer, in order that the victor’s exploit might be more exalted. Thus Pausanias, in mentioning the bronze chariot of Kratisthenes of Kyrene by Pythagoras of Rhegion,[1903] says that statues of Nike and Kratisthenes himself are mounted upon the car. The Nike in some cases was replaced by the figure of a young maiden, who stood beside the victor, as in the cases of the Elean Timon[1904] and the Macedonian Lampos.[1905] Pliny notes a similar example in reference to the chariot of Teisikrates, a Delphian victor in the two-horse chariot-race.[1906] The maiden in all these cases may have been merely a Nike personified or a mortal.[1907] Pliny records that the painter Nikomachos, son and pupil of Aristeides, painted a _Victoria quadrigam in sublime rapiens_.[1908] The figure of Nike appears often on reliefs. Thus on a terra-cotta sarcophagus from Klazomenai we see a two-horse chariot driven by a boy, while alongside is a winged female figure—Iris or Nike—mounting it.[1909] The moment of victory is shown on an Attic marble votive relief representing a four-horse chariot, now in the British Museum. Here a figure of Nike is represented as floating in the air and extending a wreath (now wanting) towards the head of the charioteer, who is draped with a tunic girdled at the waist, as he mounts the car. If the charioteer in this relief is a female (which is doubtful), it may he the personification of the city to which the winner belongs.[1910] On a votive relief in Athens a horse is represented as being crowned by Nike.[1911] On a relief in Madrid Nike is represented as driving a chariot.[1912] A quadriga with a female figure, apparently Nike, appears on a relief dedicated to Hermes and the Nymphs, which was found in Phaleron.[1913] Doubtless some of the chariot-groups at Olympia represented movement—the start, the course, or the end of the race—as do these and similar reliefs.[1914] We should add that the figure of Nike was not confined to equestrian monuments. On the Ficoroni cista in Rome is represented the boxing match between Polydeukes and Amykos among the Bebrykes. In the centre we see Amykos hanged to a tree by the hands, while to the right stands Athena, and above her Nike is flying with a crown and fillet of victory for Polydeukes.[1915]

REMAINS OF CHARIOT-GROUPS.

From this discussion of the literary evidence about the monuments of chariot victors at Olympia and elsewhere, we shall turn to a brief consideration of certain existing works of sculpture, reliefs and statues, which will serve to illustrate the manner in which the sculptor represented this class of victor monuments.

[Illustration: FIG. 63.—Charioteer Mounting a Chariot. Bas-relief from the Akropolis. Akropolis Museum, Athens.]

The motive of representing a figure in the act of mounting a chariot is old. Amphiaraos was thus represented on the chest of Kypselos at Olympia[1916] and appears in a similar pose on the b.-f. Corinthian vase from Cerveteri, now in Berlin, which we have already mentioned.[1917] Among reliefs we shall first discuss the Parian (?) marble one found in 1822 near the Propylaia at Athens and now in the Akropolis Museum (Fig. 63).[1918] Here we see represented a robed figure stepping into a chariot, holding the reins in the extended hands. This Attic work, perhaps dating from the very beginning of the fifth century B. C., has long been admired for its vigor and grace. Whether the figure is male or female, human or divine, is still a matter of debate. The head is too badly weathered to make the decision final. The upper part of the figure of Hermes (?) on another fragment, which appears to come from the same relief and which was found near the south wall of the Akropolis in 1859,[1919] has made it seem reasonable to call the charioteer a god, perhaps Apollo.[1920] The hair of Hermes and of the charioteer is arranged in the old Attic _krobylos_ fashion. This also makes it natural to interpret the charioteer as male, despite the slender and delicate arms and hands, which appear to be female.[1921] But such effeminate male figures are not unknown to Attic art, which was characterized by grace and softness.[1922] The line of the breast, however, shows no such fulness as archaic masters were wont to give to female forms, and hence this figure may very well be that of a male. Schrader has tried to refer the slab to the frieze of the Old Temple of Athena, which, he believes, survived the sack of the Akropolis by Xerxes,[1923] thus assuming a chariot-frieze similar to the later one appearing on the Mausoleion at Halikarnassos, which antedated similar scenes on the Parthenon frieze by nearly a century. As the Parthenon slabs represent mortal charioteers, who are doubtless males, the relief may also represent a mortal. However, the Akropolis relief may have had nothing to do with any temple frieze nor with the adornment of a great altar of Athena, as Furtwaengler contended,[1924] but may be from a votive monument set up by a chariot victor.[1925]

We see a good representation in relief of a chariot-group on one side of the arched roof of the so-called Chimæra tomb discovered by Sir Charles Fellows at Xanthos in Lykia. Here is represented a chariot drawn by four horses, in which stands a charioteer, with sleeved tunic and Phrygian cap, and an armed figure. Because of the figure of the Chimæra in the lower right-hand corner, the charioteer, despite the absence of Pegasos, has been called Bellerophon.[1926]

THE APOBATES CHARIOT-RACE.

On the north frieze of the Parthenon there were originally at least 9 four-horse chariot groups,[1927] while on the south frieze there were 10 such groups.[1928] These various groups represent a ceremonial chariot-race called the _apobates_, known at Athens and in Bœotia and a favorite contest at the Panathenaic games.[1929] This race preserved the tradition of Homeric warfare, when the chieftain was driven to battle in his chariot, but dismounted to fight, remounting only to pursue or avoid his enemy. During the race, while the charioteer kept the horses at full speed, the _apobates_ dismounted, ran alongside the chariot, and mounted again. In the last lap he dismounted and ran beside the chariot to the goal.[1930] In the North frieze we see the charioteer in the chariot, and the _apobates_, armed with shield and helmet, either stepping down from the chariot or standing beside it; while a third figure, a marshal, stands nearby. Thus on slab XIV we see the _apobates_ about to step down; on slab XV he is standing up in the chariot; on slab XVII (Fig. 64) he is leaning back, supporting himself by means of his right hand, which grasps the chariot rail, and is just ready to step down; on slab XXII he is remounting the chariot. In the scenes on the South frieze, on the other hand, the _apobates_ is not represented as dismounting, but is standing either inside the chariot or by its side. The South frieze, therefore, represents preparation or the beginning of the race, while the North one represents the actual course. There is, therefore, as Gardiner points out, no need to accept Michaelis’ theory that the two friezes portray different motives, the North one representing the _apobates_ at the games and the South one representing war-chariots. The double character of the race is shown by inscriptions which make both charioteer and _apobates_ equally victors. Many other reliefs show the _apobates_ dismounting. Thus, on a fragmentary relief found in 1886 at the Amphiareion at Oropos and now in Athens,[1931] we see a nude and beardless youth standing in a chariot, which is moving rapidly to the left. He has a helmet on his head and a shield in his left hand and holds on to the rim of the chariot, as in the Parthenon frieze slab just mentioned. To his right is a charioteer with his arms outstretched to hold the reins. As this relief is obviously influenced by the Parthenon frieze, it must stand midway between that frieze and the Hellenistic relief to be described below. Another relief, found at Oropos in 1835[1932] and dating from the first half of the fourth century B. C., represents a four-horse chariot moving to the left and containing two persons. One is the charioteer, who has long waving hair and a short beard and is clothed in the usual long tunic; the other is a nude _apobates_, who is armed with helmet and shield and holds on to the rim of the chariot with his right hand, the upper part of his body being inclined backwards, the knees bent, and the shield held away from the body.[1933] We can not say whether these two reliefs from the Amphiareion represent offerings of _apobatai_, who were victorious at races held in Oropos or elsewhere in Bœotia, or represent the victorious Panathenaic _apobatai_. They may well be _ex votos_ to the hero Amphiaraos at the games held in Oropos. We see an excellent illustration of an _apobates_ in the very act of dismounting on a Hellenistic votive relief discovered in 1880 on the Akropolis, which dates from the end of the fourth century B. C.[1934] A marble relief, supposably from Herculaneum, but now in Portugal,[1935] represents a figure dressed in a long chiton. Wolters suggests that it may represent an _apobates_, but the absence of the usual armor makes it probable that a charioteer is intended. In a future section we shall discuss the _apobates_ in the horse-race at Olympia known as κάλπη.

[Illustration: FIG. 64.—Apobates and Chariot. Relief from the North Frieze of the Parthenon, Athens.]

[Illustration: FIG. 65.—Charioteer. Relief from the small Frieze of the Mausoleion, Halikarnassos. British Museum, London.]

STATUES OF CHARIOTEERS.

The best-preserved slab from the small Parian marble chariot-frieze from the Mausoleion of Halikarnassos, now in the British Museum, represents a male figure standing in a chariot (Fig. 65).[1936] This long-haired charioteer, dressed in a tunic which extends to the feet and is girded at the waist, is leaning forward in an eager attitude. The folds of his garment curved to the wind show the speed of his horses, and the mutilated face discloses a look of intense excitement. The deep-set eyes and overhanging brows recall the Tegea heads of Skopas (Fig. 73) and the combatants pictured on the so-called _Alexander Sarcophagus_ discovered near Sidon in 1887 and now in Constantinople.[1937] The pose is so characteristic and spirited that it was copied by later artists on reliefs and gems.[1938] The same pose, forward inclination of the body, half-opened mouth, and intense look seem to be reproduced in a statue of the fourth century B. C. now in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (Pl. 27).[1939] Robinson, because of the similarity of its head to certain heads of Apollo published by Overbeck,[1940] interpreted this statue as Apollo starting to run. Von Mach, however, has pointed out that its head bears a more striking resemblance to that of a _Kore_ in Vienna.[1941] Klein interpreted it as a jumper, assuming that the two supports on the legs were for the wrists, indicating that the arms were held downwards, the hands, then, holding _halteres_. But von Mach makes it clear that these supports are not parallel, as Klein thought, but that they diverge outwards and consequently may have made the connection with the sides of a chariot rim. Furthermore, the likeness to the figure on the Mausoleion frieze (Fig. 65) makes it probable that we are here concerned with a charioteer. The objection to this theory on the ground of nudity is baseless. Though the conventional garb of the charioteer in Greek art from the eighth century B. C. onwards[1942] was certainly a long, close-fitting chiton, there are several examples in existence of nude charioteers.[1943] Similarly the objection that the artificial head-dress does not belong to a charioteer is equally erroneous. Klein has shown that it appears on several heads of boys, and, as von Mach says, it is certainly no better suited to Apollo or a jumper than to a boy driving colts in a chariot-race. The pose of the Boston statue also reminds us somewhat of that of the small bronze statue of a boy found in the Rhine near Xanten in 1858 and now in Berlin.[1944] This is a Roman work seemingly inspired by a Greek prototype, and has been interpreted variously as the statue of _Bonus Eventus, Novus Annus_, and Dionysos. However, here again the forward inclination of the body points to the interpretation of a charioteer,[1945] despite its nudity. The nude statue found on the Esquiline in 1874 and now in the Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome, which has already been mentioned,[1946] has been shown to be that of a charioteer by a comparison with figures on Attic vases which represent mortals and gods entering chariots, and with a figure on the so-called _Satrap Sarcophagus_ in Constantinople.[1947] The youth is represented as standing on his left foot; he places his right on the chariot floor and extends his hands to hold the reins. The statue seems to be a mediocre Roman copy of a Greek original bronze of about the middle of the fifth century _B. C._, as it shows certain traces of archaism. Furtwaengler has assigned it to the sculptor Kalamis along with a closely connected group of monuments.[1948]

[Illustration: PLATE 27

Statue of a Charioteer (?). Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.]

[Illustration: FIG. 66.—Bronze Statue of the Delphi _Charioteer_. Museum of Delphi.]

Finally, in this connection, even though it has nothing to do with monuments set up at Olympia, we shall discuss the life-size bronze statue of the _Charioteer_ discovered by the French in 1896 in the excavations of Delphi, and now the cynosure of the village museum there. (Fig. 66.)[1949] This example of ripe archaic art is one of the finest bronzes yet recovered in Greece. Its ancient fame is disclosed by the fact that it was copied in many monuments down to the end of antiquity.[1950] The figure is clothed in a short-sleeved chiton, which reached nearly to the ground, and is girded above the waist. With the figure were found also fragments of reins, which were held in the extended right hand, portions of three horses, a chariot pole, and the left arm and hand of a second figure, that of a boy or woman, showing that the _Charioteer_ was part of a group. The group rested on a base on which was cut a two-line metrical inscription, the ends of which are preserved. The first line ends Πολύζαλός μ’ ἀνέθηκεν. A part of the inscription is lost and another part, including the above words, is written over the erased original, which is still partly legible. The original inscription gives the name of the first dedicator as ending in ιλας. From this ending Professor Washburn recovers the name Ἀρκεσίλας. He refers the original dedication to Arkesilas IV of Kyrene,[1951] and identifies it with the group known from Pausanias to have been dedicated at Delphi by the people of Kyrene, representing Battos and the figure of Libya crowning him in a chariot and the charioteer personified as Kyrene outside, the whole being the work of the Knossian sculptor Amphion.[1952] Svoronos[1953] follows Washburn’s suggestion and identifies the _Charioteer_ with Battos, believing that the fragment of the left arm found with the statue is from the statue of Kyrene represented as a charioteer.[1954] Ingenious as the theory is, there are chronological difficulties in the way of accepting it unreservedly. Thus Amphion’s pupil Pison worked on the Spartan memorial of Aigospotamoi at Delphi in 404 B. C.[1955] Furthermore, the ending ιλας may equally well refer to Anaxilas, the tyrant of Rhegion, as the original dedicator,[1956] in which case it seems reasonable to assume that the group might have been the work of Pythagoras, the great sculptor of Rhegion.[1957] A Greek scholar believes that the original dedicator was Gelo, and that his name was erased and replaced by that of his brother Polyzalos; he consequently dates the group shortly after Gelo’s death in 478 B. C.[1958] He refers it to Glaukias of Aegina, while Joubin[1959] classes the _Charioteer_ as an Attic work. However, the whole subject of Greek sculpture in the years just after the Persian war period is too complicated to name definitely the artist of this simple and severe work. Its deficiencies are as apparent as its virtues. Thus the parallel folds of the chiton show little of the form beneath; the feet are too flatly placed on the ground, and the contour of the head and face is not altogether graceful.[1960] Whatever the original purpose of the group was, it may well have been used by Polyzalos to honor the Pythian victory of his brother Hiero.[1961] From it, then, we can get, perhaps, an idea of the magnificence of Hiero’s monument by Onatas and Kalamis at Olympia.

DEDICATIONS OF VICTORS IN THE HORSE-RACE AT OLYMPIA AND ELSEWHERE.

The hippic victor at Olympia frequently dedicated merely the model of his victorious horse without the jockey, just as the early chariot victor dedicated a chariot without the charioteer. We have evidence of several instances of this custom from the sixth century B. C. on. Krokon of Eretria dedicated a small horse of bronze in the Altis.[1962] The Corinthian Pheidolas dedicated a model of his horse alone, but for a different reason.[1963] The jockey who rode for him fell off at the start, but the mare, named _Aura_, continued the race and reached the goal as victor. The owner was allowed by the judges to set up a monument to her. The sons of Pheidolas were also victors in the horse-race[1964] and set up a horse on a column with an epigram upon it—ἵππος ἐπὶ στήλῃ πεποιημένος καὶ ἐπίγραμμά ἐστιν ἐπ’ αὐτῷ. Just how this monument looked is doubtful. Pausanias may have seen the bronze horse of the father Pheidolas, and nearby a column with a bas-relief representing the horse of the sons;[1965] or the horse may have stood on top of the column in the round, since the epigram was ἐπ’ αὐτῷ (on the horse) and not ἐπ’ αὐτῇ (on the stele).[1966]

More frequently a jockey was seated upon the model of the horse, just as we see frequently on vase-paintings. In the Olympic monument of King Hiero already mentioned, race-horses with boys seated upon them stood on either side of the chariot in honor of his two victories in the horse-race and one in the chariot-race.[1967] Another Olympia group represented the boy horse-racer Aigyptos on horseback, and his father, the chariot victor Timon, standing beside him.[1968] This is also a case in which the victor (Aigyptos) acted as his own jockey. In the group representing Xenombrotos of Kos, the horse-racer, and his son, the boy boxer Xenodikos, by the Aeginetan Philotimos and the Chian Pantias respectively, the boy was seated on a horse and the statue of the father stood nearby.[1969] The base of this group has been recovered, large enough to have carried the two monuments.[1970] Pliny says that the sculptors Kanachos and Hegias made groups of horse-racers.[1971] We have seen that Pausanias mentions others by Kalamis and Daidalos. The work of Kalamis, the immediate predecessor of Pheidias, an artist noted for his grace and softness and as an unrivaled sculptor of horses,[1972] must have been excellent.

MONUMENTS ILLUSTRATING THE HORSE-RACE.

When we turn to the monuments which illustrate the horse-race, we find as varied a number—vase-paintings, reliefs, coins, statuary, etc.—as in the case of chariot victors.

[Illustration: FIG. 67.—Horse-Racer. From a Sixth-Century B. C. b.-f. Panathenaic Vase. British Museum, London.]

Vase-paintings show that the jockey was generally nude and rode without stirrups or saddle. We see nude long-haired jockeys on horseback with whips pictured on a sixth-century B. C. Panathenaic amphora in the British Museum.[1973] One also appears on a silver tetradrachm in the same museum, which commemorates the Olympic victory of Philip II of Macedonia.[1974] Here the victorious mounted jockey has a palm in his hand, the symbol of his victory. On the other hand, the jockey is sometimes represented as wearing a close-fitting short-sleeved chiton. We see such a one on an archaic b.-f. Panathenaic vase of the sixth century B. C. in the British Museum (Fig. 67).[1975] In front of the mounted youth on this vase stands a herald in official robes, from whose mouth issue the words “the horse of Dyneiketos is victorious.” Behind the jockey is an attendant bearing a wreath in his left hand and holding a prize tripod over his head. The short chiton also appears on a horse-racer on the Amphiaraos vase.[1976] We see racing boys on a proto-Corinthian lekythos in the museum at Taranto, with tripods as prizes.[1977] A fine example of five nude horse-racers also appears on a vase pictured in the Daremberg-Saglio Dictionary.[1978] Here one has fallen from his horse and is being dragged by the bridle.

A boy on a galloping horse is shown on a terra-cotta relief from Thera.[1979] On a funerary marble relief from Sicily, now in the Museo Gregoriano, Rome, a rider is represented urging his horse on with a whip.[1980] An Athenian relief shows victorious ephebes leading horses,[1981] while another from Athens shows a mounted boy.[1982] Horsemen representing Athenian knights appear on many slabs of the Parthenon frieze,[1983] either mounted or standing by their horses.

The inscribed base of Onatas found on the Akropolis seems to have borne the statue of a horse-racer.[1984] The bronze statue of Isokrates at Athens, which represented him as a παῖς κελητίζων, is mentioned by the pseudo-Plutarch.[1985] A bronze statuette in Athens from Dodona represents an ephebe on a galloping horse.[1986] A statue in the Palazzo Orlandi in Florence represents a horse-rider.[1987] In the Akropolis Museum there are two monuments which we should mention in this connection. One is the lower part of the statue of a nude rider on horseback, the mutilated horse being represented as pawing the ground with its forefoot. Closely resembling it in scale and finish, though more developed in style, is another fragmentary statue of a horse without a rider, the latter probably to be understood as standing in front of the horse, as in some of the riders pictured on the Parthenon frieze. The two are good examples of pre-Persian Attic sculpture.[1988] A later example is the small bronze statuette of an ephebe represented as a horseman (the horse is lacking) discovered recently at the French excavations at Volubilis in Morocco. This almost perfectly preserved work has been referred to the first half of the fifth century B. C.[1989] The position of the hands holding the reins reminds us strongly of the Delphi _Charioteer_ (Fig. 66). The diadem in the hair shows that a victor is represented. A small bronze statuette in the Loeb collection in Munich represents a boy riding a prancing horse, which is standing on its hind legs. This vigorous, but poorly finished, work is decorative in character and probably once belonged to the crown of a candelabrum. It appears to be either an Etruscan or early Roman work based on a Hellenistic original.[1990]

THE APOBATES HORSE-RACE.

In a previous section we discussed the _apobates_ chariot-race run at the Panathenaic games in Athens, in which the _apobates_ leaped down and ran to the goal abreast of the chariot. We shall now briefly speak of a similar race at Olympia (the κάλπη) in which the rider leaped from his mare in the last lap and ran with her to the goal.[1991] There is no certain illustration in sculpture or on vase-paintings of this race, but Gardiner believes that something like it appears on coins of Tarentum, on which a nude youth, armed with a small round shield, is represented in the act of jumping from his horse.[1992] The military character of this race, like that of the _apobates_ chariot-race discussed, is shown by the shield held in the left hand of the dismounting horseman. Helbig has shown that the Greek knight of the sixth century B. C. was merely a mounted infantryman, the successor of the Homeric warrior who used his chariot merely for pursuit or flight, while actually fighting from the ground.[1993] Just so the knight rode to battle on his horse, but dismounted when near the enemy, leaving the horse in charge of his squire, as the Homeric chieftain left his chariot in charge of his charioteer. This old custom of the heroic age survived not only in the Panathenaic chariot-race, but also, for a few years in the fifth century B. C., in the Olympic mare-race known as the κάλπη. It seems to have been instituted there for military reasons in order to revive the old form of fighting that had gone out of use just at the close of the sixth century B. C., but it endured for only a half century, from Ols. 71 to 84 (= 496 to 444 B. C.). The corresponding chariot-race at Athens and elsewhere continued at least to the end of the fourth century B. C.

DEDICATIONS OF MUSICAL VICTORS AT OLYMPIA AND ELSEWHERE.

In closing this chapter we shall say a few words about monuments erected to trumpeters, heralds, and musical victors at Olympia, though such contests had nothing to do with athletics.

Contests for trumpeters and heralds were held in many parts of Greece.[1994] They were introduced at Olympia in Ol. 96 (= 396 B. C.), when Timaios of Elis won as trumpeter and Krates of Elis as herald.[1995] Pausanias mentions an altar, near the entrance to the stadion, upon which trumpeters and heralds stood when competing.[1996] Such contests seem to have been mere displays of lung power. Herodoros, for example, who won as trumpeter at Olympia ten times in the last quarter of the fourth and beginning of the third century B. C.[1997], could blow two trumpets at once so loud that no one could stand near him.[1998] To perform such a feat he was said to be a very large man.[1999] Diogenes, son of Dionysios of Ephesos, won five victories in trumpeting at Olympia. He was twice _periodonikes_ and also won many other victories at the Isthmus, Nemea, and elsewhere—eighty in all.[2000] We have an excellent bronze statuette of a trumpeter, which was found in the Hieron of Athena Chalkioikos at Sparta, dating from the middle of the fifth century B. C., about a century and a half before the event was introduced at Olympia.[2001] This “little masterpiece of Spartan art,” whose style resembles that of the Olympia pediment sculptures, represents a nude man standing, the left arm hanging by his side, while the right is bent upwards to the mouth, where it held a tubular object pointing upwards. Since the lips are tightly compressed, Dickins has interpreted the object as a trumpet. A much damaged bronze statuette in the British Museum represents a man playing on a long trumpet-shaped instrument.[2002] Trumpeters also appear now and then on r.-f. Attic vases of the middle of the fifth century B. C.

Music victors played a greater role at Delphi than elsewhere, since music from the first was the chief interest there. Monuments to such victors, though few in number, by little-known artists were set up there, but they seem to have enjoyed the same meagre honor at Delphi as the statues of athletic victors.[2003] We have record of a statue of the Epizephyrian Locrian _kitharoidos_ Eunomos, set up in his native town in honor of his Pythian victory over Ariston of Rhegion. Timaios says that this monument showed a cicada seated on the singer’s lyre.[2004] Whether such monuments at Delphi or elsewhere were regarded as victor or votive in character, we can not say.[2005] Pausanias mentions several statues of poets and musicians, mostly mythical, on Mount Helikon, which were set up partly in consequence of victories won there or elsewhere.[2006] Of these the statue of the Thracian or Odrysian Thamyris was represented as a blind man holding a broken lyre;[2007] that of Arion of Methymna as riding a dolphin;[2008] that of Hesiod, seated, as holding a lute on his knees; and that of the Thracian Orpheus with Telete at his side and round about beasts in stone and bronze listening to his song. Of the statue of the Argive Sakadas, Pausanias says that the sculptor, not understanding Pindar’s poem on the victor, made the flutist no bigger than the flute.[2009] The epigram on the statue of the Sikyonian flutist Bacchiadas, mentioned by Athenæus as standing on Mount Helikon,[2010] was votive in character. The inscribed base of the statue of the _kitharoidos_ Alkibios has been found on the Athenian Akropolis.[2011] Musical contests are pictured on many imitation Panathenaic vases, and many Greek reliefs seem to have been set up in honor of such victors. Among the latter we might instance the one in the Louvre representing Apollo, Artemis, and Leto,[2012] and another found in Sparta in 1885, which represents Artemis pouring a libation before Apollo.[2013]

At Olympia flute-playing accompanied certain of the events of the pentathlon. Pausanias says that the reason why the flute played a Pythian air while the athletes jumped was that this air was sacred to Apollo, who had beaten Hermes in running and Ares in boxing at Olympia.[2014] Thus on the chest of Kypselos a flutist was represented as standing between Admetos and Mopsos at their boxing match.[2015] But the explanation given by Philostratos seems more sensible, that leaping was a difficult contest, and that the flute stimulated the jumpers.[2016] At Argos, at the games in honor of Zeus Σθένιος, wrestlers contended to the tune of the flute.[2017] Many vase-paintings illustrate flute-playing at the pentathlon.[2018] At Olympia only a few monuments were set up in honor of musical victors, and these seem to have been statues erected _honoris causa_, instead of primarily for victories. An example is that of the Sikyonian flutist Pythokritos, who won a victory as αὐλητής in the sixth century B. C.[2019] Pausanias says that his monument was that of a small man with a flute wrought in relief on an inscribed slab. The explanation of such a description probably is that the size of the flute made the victor appear small, just as in the case of the monument of Sakadas just mentioned.[2020] We know that artists, poets, prose writers, musicians, and actors all had an audience at Olympia, and that statues were often erected there in honor of such men, though these are not to be treated as victor monuments and do not properly fall within the scope of the present work.[2021]

CHAPTER VI.

TWO MARBLE HEADS FROM VICTOR STATUES.[2022]

PLATES 28-30 AND FIGURES 68-77.

THE GROUP OF DAOCHOS AT DELPHI, AND LYSIPPOS.

If in these later years our knowledge of Skopas has been greatly augmented by the discovery of the Tegea heads (Fig. 73), that of Lysippos has been almost revolutionized. With the discovery in 1894 at Delphi of the group of statues dedicated by the Thessalian Daochos[2023] in honor of various members of his house, whose dates covered nearly two centuries,[2024] an entirely new impetus was given to the study of the last of the great Greek sculptors. Homolle immediately recognized the fourth-century origin of the group, and at first pronounced the statue of Agias Lysippan;[2025] later he saw in the types, poses, and proportions of the group the mixed influences of Praxiteles, Skopas, and Lysippos, but referred the _Agias_ to the school of Skopas,[2026] while still later he again pronounced it Lysippan.[2027] But its true character was not destined to be long in doubt. When Erich Preuner[2028] found almost the same metrical inscription, which was on the base of the best preserved statue of the group, that of Agias (Pl. 28 and Fig. 68),[2029] in the traveling journal of Stackelberg,[2030] copied from a base in Pharsalos, the Thessalian home of Daochos, with the additional information that Lysippos of Sikyon made the statue, our views of the work of that artist had to undergo a thorough revision. For this discovery brought the _Agias_—if not the others of the group—into direct relation to Lysippos by documentary evidence, while the easily recognized Lysippan characteristics of the statue—the slender body and limbs, the small head, the proportions and pose—confirmed this connection on stylistic grounds. It became clear that Daochos had set up a series of statues in honor of his ancestors both at Pharsalos and Delphi. Whether the Thessalian group was of bronze, as is generally held, owing to the widespread belief that Lysippos worked only in metal, and the Delphian group was composed of contemporary marble copies of those originals, will be discussed further on. If the marble group was a copy, we may infer that it reproduced the original statues, not mechanically and laboriously as was often the case in Roman days, but accurately; for having employed a noted artist in the one case, the dedicator would have desired an accurate reproduction of the work in the other.

[Illustration: PLATE 28

Statue of the Pancratiast Agias, from Delphi. Museum of Delphi.]

[Illustration: FIG. 68.—Head from the Statue of Agias (Pl. 28). Museum of Delphi.]

THE APOXYOMENOS OF THE VATICAN, AND LYSIPPOS.

[Illustration: PLATE 29

Statue of the _Apoxyomenos_, after Lysippos or his School. Vatican Museum, Rome.]

But another statue, the _Apoxyomenos_, of the Vatican (Pl. 29),[2031] ever since its discovery by Canina in 1849, had held the honored place of being regarded as the centre of the stylistic treatment of Lysippos. Seldom has the discovery of a Roman copy of a Greek original proved so important for the study of ancient sculpture as this athlete statue, which was found in an appropriate place, in the ruins of a building, which almost certainly was a Roman bath. Despite unimportant restorations, the statue is well preserved. The fingers of the right hand holding the die were wrongly restored by the sculptor Tenerani at the suggestion of Canina who wrongly interpreted the passage in Pliny (XXXIV, 55), which refers to two works by Polykleitos, _destringentem se et nudum talo incessentem_, as meaning one and the same monument.[2032] This slightly over life-size statue represents a nude athlete, who is standing with legs far apart, employed in scraping the sand and oil from his extended right arm with a strigil held in the left hand. This, as we saw in Chapter III, was a common palæstra motive.[2033] Despite certain portrait-like features, this statue may not represent an individual victor, but, like Myron’s great work, an athletic model. The words of Pliny,[2034] which mention one of the best-known works of Lysippos in antiquity—it heads the list in his account of the sculptor—as an athlete _destringentem se_, and his statement in another passage[2035] that Lysippos introduced a new canon into art _capita minora faciendo quam antiqui, corpora graciliora siccioraque, per quae proceritas signorum major videretur_, _i. e._, a canon of bodily proportions essentially different from that of Polykleitos, seemed to have their best illustration in the slender and graceful body and limbs, and noticeably small head of this statue. It was, therefore, though admittedly a Roman work, long regarded as a direct copy of the Lysippan original, and as faithfully representing his style in every detail.[2036] Such a view, of course, was founded entirely on circumstantial evidence, and could not survive any positive evidence to the contrary which might come to light in the future. G. F. Hill, in speaking of the insufficient evidence on which the _Apoxyomenos_ had been accepted as the key to Lysippan style, rightly remarks: “It is more scientific, until we acquire documentary evidence of excellent character, to classify our extant examples of ancient art as representing tendencies rather than men.”[2037] The Lysippan character of the Vatican statue had not been seriously attacked until the discovery of the _Agias_. Its original was certainly a work worthy of Lysippos. Its rhythm, proportions, and fine modeling have received praise of connoisseurs ever since its discovery. Its difficult pose had been remarkably well executed. While appearing at rest, the statue suggests vigorous action both by its supple limbs and the suppressed excitement indicated by the partly opened lips, an excitement befitting a victorious athlete. Perhaps it was the difficulty of such a pose that best explains why the _Apoxyomenos_ has left no other copy.[2038] The very excellence of the Vatican statue prejudiced us in favor of regarding it as an illustration of Lysippos’ ideal of bodily proportions. But we really knew very little of the original _Apoxyomenos_, only what we gathered from Pliny, that Lysippos made such a statue and that it was carried to Rome by M. Agrippa and was set up in front of his Thermæ, whence it was removed by the enamored Tiberius to his bed-chamber, only to be restored when the populace remonstrated. As for the proportions of the supposed copy in question, they only prove that this statue goes back to an original which was not earlier than Lysippos, but not that it was by the master himself.[2039] The discovery of the _Agias_ showed us at last on what slender foundations our theory had been built. Despite certain well-marked similarities in the pose, proportions, and relatively small head—characteristics which were not even exclusively Lysippan, since they are just as prominent in certain other works, _e. g._, in the warriors of the Mausoleion frieze—between the _Agias_ and the _Apoxyomenos_, nevertheless just as striking differences appear, which make it difficult to keep both statues as examples of the artistic tendency of one and the same artist, even if we should assign them to different periods of his career.

THE AGIAS AND THE APOXYOMENOS COMPARED, AND THE STYLE OF LYSIPPOS.

These differences are most apparent in the surface modeling and facial expression of the two works. In the _Agias_ the muscles are not over-emphasized in detail, but show the simple observation of nature characteristic of artists who worked before the scientific study of anatomy at the Museum of Alexandria had reacted upon sculpture. In the _Apoxyomenos_, on the other hand, we see an intentional display of the new learning in the labored and detailed treatment of the muscles, which disclose a knowledge of anatomy unknown before the Hellenistic age. This academic treatment, culminating later in such realistic works as the _Laocoön_ and the _Farnese Herakles_, can hardly have antedated the beginning of the third century B. C., when anatomy was studied by the physicians Herophilos and Erasistratos, a date after the close of the activity of Lysippos. We see no trace of this influence in the _Agias_. Moreover, the face of the latter discloses the intense expression, which is elsewhere seen only in works supposed to be by, or influenced by, Skopas, which recalls what Plutarch[2040] said of Lysippos’ portraits of Alexander, that they reproduced his masculine and leonine air (αὐτοῦ τὸ ἀρρενωπὸν καὶ λεοντῶδες); for a comparison of this face with that of the _Apoxyomenos_, which exhibits the lifelessness and lack of expression so characteristic of many early Hellenistic works, makes it still more evident that we must be on our guard against assuming that both works are representative of the same sculptor. The essential differences in physical type and artistic execution between the two statues have been well summarized by K. T. Frost in a letter published by Prof. Percy Gardner in the latter’s treatment of the same subject.[2041] After a careful analysis of these differences, Frost closes by saying: “It is difficult to believe that the two statues represent works by the same artist; it is not only the type of man, but the way in which that type is expressed which forms the contrast.” He compares the _Apoxyomenos_ with the _Borghese Warrior_ (Fig. 43) as true products of the Hellenistic age.

When we consider these differences between the two statues, we see that our judgment of Lysippan art must depend on how we interpret them. We may either flatly reject the _Apoxyomenos_ and put the _Agias_ in its place as representing the norm of Lysippan art, or keep the _Apoxyomenos_ and reject the _Agias_ as evidence; or lastly we may keep both as characteristic works of two different periods in the artistic career of Lysippos, explaining the differences as the result of influence or of the lapse of years. A recent writer, to be sure, has cut the Gordian knot by rejecting both statues, and placing the _Apoxyomenos_ of the Uffizi—which we have treated at length in a preceding chapter (Pl. 12)—as the key to our knowledge of the art of Lysippos.[2042] But such a solution of the problem raises even more difficulties. Long before the _Agias_ came to light some critics, indeed, had doubted whether the _Apoxyomenos_ really represented the work of Lysippos, as its Hellenistic character seemed evident. Thus, in 1877, Ulrich Koehler,[2043] following a still earlier judgment,[2044] had come to the conclusion that the Vatican statue was only a free reproduction of Lysippos’ masterpiece and attributed its Hellenistic characteristics to the Roman copyist; but even yet the school which long recognized the _Apoxyomenos_ as the norm of Lysippos has its supporters,[2045] though many archæologists have now supplanted the _Apoxyomenos_ by the _Agias_.[2046] Others, not willing to renounce the _Apoxyomenos_ as evidence, accept both it and the _Agias_ as characteristic works of the master, appealing to the length of his career to explain the differences, and suggesting that in his youth Lysippos was under the influence of Skopas, but later in life attained independence, and followed a more anatomical rendering for his athlete statues.[2047] However, despite the fact that other artists must have influenced Lysippos,[2048] the _Agias_ can not be shown to be a youthful work of his, nor can the special influence of Skopas be shown to have been that of master on pupil, but rather of one great master on another and equally great contemporary. The difficulty about penetrating the obscurity surrounding Lysippos comes largely from the fact that he borrowed traits from several of his predecessors and contemporaries. The influence of Polykleitos, Skopas, and Praxiteles, and especially of the last two, as Homolle emphasized in his study of the Daochos group,[2049] can be certainly traced in the _Agias_. Fräulein Bieber, in a recent article,[2050] while denying that Lysippos had anything to do with the Delphian group, tries to prove that one figure in it shows the influence of Praxiteles, another that of Polykleitos, and a third that of Skopas. She believes that the sculptor of the _Agias_ had seen the original bronze statue, the work of Lysippos, which stood in Pharsalos. However, we may leave any such conclusion to one side, and judge between the _Agias_ and the _Apoxyomenos_ solely on the merits of the two statues.

The differences between them appear to us too great to be reconciled on any such principles as those just rehearsed, for their style and technique seem to represent two distinct periods of art. If one is to be rejected, the connection of the _Agias_ with Lysippos certainly rests on better evidence than does the _Apoxyomenos_. By separating them completely, it is possible both to assign to Lysippos the early date which other evidence points to, and to remove the _Apoxyomenos_ entirely from the fourth century B. C., thus explaining its later modeling, comparatively expressionless features, body-build (which shows the use of three planes, instead of two), and other Hellenistic details. We should, then, see in its original a work not by Lysippos at all, but by some pupil or later member of his school, a work retaining merely traces of the style of the master. In thus eliminating the _Apoxyomenos_ we are justified in following Homolle’s lead in assigning the statue of Agias to Lysippos, in spite of arguments which have been adduced against attributing it to Lysippos and in spite of recent criticism of the inscriptions of the Delphian bases, by which Wolters tries to prove that the inscription on the base of the statue of Agias, and consequently the _Agias_ itself, antedate the inscription and dedication at Pharsalos.[2051] We may, therefore, until further discoveries prove the contrary, consider it as the centre of our treatment of that sculptor. Whether the _Apoxyomenos_ is to be explained as emanating from the immediate environment of Lysippos, or is to be regarded as a work illustrating the last phase of his development, or the innovation of another master—in any case it seems to us clearly to belong to an age essentially different from that which conceived the _Agias_.[2052]

As the _Agias_ is a statue of a victor in the pankration, we can learn from it how Lysippos represented such an athlete. In giving up the _Apoxyomenos_, we must also give up statues of athletes which have hitherto been assigned to Lysippos on the basis of their resemblance to it, and the future ascription of statues of this class must be based on stylistic resemblances to the statue of Agias. Thus, for example, we should give up the statue of a youth in Berlin, and the two statues of athletes represented in lunging attitudes in Dresden, which Furtwaengler, on the basis of the _Apoxyomenos_, believed were copies of originals by Lysippos,[2053] and the Roman male head in Turin, published by A. J. B. Wace,[2054] whose original is somewhat later than that of the _Apoxyomenos_. On the basis of the _Agias_, on the other hand, we may regard as Lysippan the statue of an athlete in Copenhagen,[2055] and perhaps the Parian marble statue of an athlete from the Palazzo Farnese now in the British Museum,[2056] with copies in Paris and Rome.[2057] This latter statue Furtwaengler ascribed to the school of Kalamis of the fifth century B. C., on account of the similarity of its style to that of the _Apollo-on-the-Omphalos_ (Fig. 7B) and of its motive to that of the _Lansdowne Herakles_ (Fig. 71 and Pl. 30); however, A. H. Smith finds it very similar to the _Agias_, and so rightly refers it to the fourth century B. C.

THE HEAD FROM OLYMPIA.

Impressed by its remarkable likeness to the head of the _Agias_, I hazarded the opinion some years ago,[2058] that the much discussed Pentelic marble head from Olympia (Frontispiece and Figure 69)[2059] was Lysippan, and attempted to bring it into relation with the statue of the Akarnanian pancratiast (whose name I restored as Philandridas), which Pausanias[2060] says was the work of Lysippos. Since then, after a careful revision of the evidence, this earlier opinion has become conviction, and I now have no hesitancy in expressing the belief that in this vigorous marble head we have to do with an original work by Lysippos himself. It will be our task briefly to rehearse the reasons for making such an ascription, despite the serious and weighty objections which might be raised against it.

[Illustration: FIG. 69.—Marble Head, from Olympia. Museum of Olympia.]

At first this head was ascribed with surprising unanimity to the school of Praxiteles,[2061] and subsequently, after the discovery of the Tegea heads, with almost equal unanimity to that of Skopas. Treu, who first published the head,[2062] pointed out its near relationship to the _Hermes_ of Praxiteles, which appeared to him to be obvious, notwithstanding the injured condition of the chin, nose, mouth, and brows. He found the general proportions, the shape of the cranium and forehead, and the form of the cheeks and mouth the same in both, while the differences, such as the deeper cut and wider opened eyes with their γοργόν expression, the hair, and the fact that the head is harder, leaner, and bonier than that of the _Hermes_, were all explained by the different character given to the statue of a victor or Herakles. Many other archæologists, as Boetticher,[2063] Laloux and Monceaux,[2064] and Furtwaengler,[2065] have also seen sure signs of the hand of Praxiteles or his school in the graceful attitude, delicate chiseling, and finish of the work. Still others,[2066] however, found every characteristic of Skopas in this head. Even Treu in his later treatment of the head found it more Skopaic than Praxitelian, and yet, by a careful analysis,[2067] he conclusively showed that the formation of the eyes, the opening of the mouth, and the treatment of the hair were so different in the heads from Tegea (and especially in that of the _Herakles_, Fig. 73) as to preclude the possibility of assigning them and the head from Olympia to the same sculptor, and so declared for some independent sculptor among the contemporaries of Skopas. However, he did not see Lysippos in this allied but independent artist, though he admitted the resemblance of the head in question to that of the _Agias_, as also Homolle,[2068] Mahler,[2069] and other critics have done.

THE OLYMPIA HEAD AND THAT OF THE AGIAS.

A detailed comparison of this head with that of the _Agias_ will show wherein the wonderful resemblance—so striking at first glance—consists and will disclose its Lysippan character. Neither head is a portrait, nor even individualized; the _Agias_ could be no portrait, for Agias was the great-grandfather of Daochos, who enlisted the services of his contemporary Lysippos in erecting his statue, and he won his victory in the pankration more than a century before this statue was set up.[2070] A glance at the head from Olympia also clearly discloses its ideal character; for it is no portrait of Philandridas, but the victor κατ’ ἐξοχήν in the pankration. The small head of the _Agias_—under life-size—first arrests attention as the chief characteristic of the whole statue and (taken with the other proportions of the body) as the chief mark of its Lysippan origin. As Homolle says, it is not that small heads are not found outside the school of Lysippos or before his day—for Myron can furnish examples of them—but it is only with Lysippos and after him that we see a conscious intention of having the proportions thus reduced. Now the head from Olympia is also less than life-size,[2071] but as the head alone is preserved, we can only assume that the proportions it bore to the body were similar to those we see in the statue of Agias. The conformation of the crania of both is, as in Attic works, round, with small, only slightly projecting occiputs, as opposed to the squareness of Polykleitan heads, which are longer from front to back and flatter on top—showing how Lysippos in this respect departed from the creator of the _Doryphoros_. This cranial conformation is almost identical in the two heads, as is clearly shown in Fig. 70, where one is drawn in profile over the other.

[Illustration: FIG. 70.—Profile Drawings of the Heads of the _Agias_ and the _Philandridas_.]

The head of the _Agias_ is turned slightly upward and to the left. Treu found traces of the use of a file on the back of the neck of the head from Olympia, which show from their position, what also was clear from the muscles of the throat, that this head also was inclined somewhat to the left and upward, possibly more than that of the _Agias_. The outlines of the face—lean and bony in both—are oval, in the head from Olympia somewhat broader, rounder, and fleshier toward the chin. In both the forehead is remarkably low, with a low depression or crease in the middle, and with a prominently projecting superciliary arcade, which breaks the continuous line from forehead to nose very perceptibly. This line is concave above and below, but convex at the projection itself, though this is less prominent in the _Agias_. The powerful framing of the eyes, which are deep-set and thrown into heavy shadows by the projecting bony structure of the brows and the overhanging masses of flesh, the eyeballs slightly raised and peering eagerly into the far distance, the slight upward inclination of the head, and the prominent forehead drawn together, all combine to give both heads (though young and vigorous) a pensive, even a sad look of heroic dignity, a look seemingly of one who takes no joy nor pleasure in victory, though it is not mournful. This humid and pensive expression was doubtless a characteristic of works of Lysippos—it was, as we know, present in his portraits of Alexander—but he did not treat it with as great intensity as did Skopas.

The eyeballs in both heads are strongly arched, though the inner angles are not so deep as in Skopaic heads; the raised upper lids form a symmetrically narrow and sharply defined border over the eyeball, and in neither head is this lid covered by a fold of skin at the outer corners, as in the Tegea heads; the mass of flesh at the outer corners is heavier in the head from Olympia, and the expression of the eyes is more free and defiant than in the more meditative _Agias_. In both, the cheek bones are high and prominent. The elegant contour of the lips of the _Agias_ is wholly wanting in the head from Olympia, in which the lips are broken off, like the nose and the chin, but it is clear that the lips were slightly parted, just showing the teeth—not, however, as in the Tegea examples, as if the breath were being drawn with great effort. The look of pensiveness is also increased by the open lips. The contour of the jawbone is not so visible as in the _Agias_, where it is clearly discernible beneath the closely drawn skin, giving the face a look of greater leanness, as of an athlete in perfect training.

In both heads the swollen and battered ears, though small, are prominent, and in both the hair is closely cropped, as becomes the athlete. The hair of the _Agias_ does not show so much expression as is displayed in that of some Lysippan heads, nor the fine detail we should expect from Pliny’s statement that Lysippos made improvements in the rendering of the hair[2072]—for it is in great measure only sketched out. In Lysippan portraits of Alexander the hair is generally expressively treated, and this is often the case in early Hellenistic heads.[2073] However, we should not expect an elaborate treatment of the hair in the statue of a pancratiast. The head from Olympia also shows great simplicity in this regard. As in Skopaic heads, the hair is fashioned into little ringlets ruffled straight up from the forehead in flat relief, but here the curls are shorter and more tense. It covers the temples and surrounds the ears as in the _Agias_, but it is not, as there, bounded by a round, floating line across the forehead, nor divided into little tufts modeled in relief radiating in concentric circles from the top of the head. While lacking in detail, the hair of the _Agias_ is treated carefully, and with the greatest variety. Narrow bands, perhaps the insignia of victory, despite their small size, encircle both heads; in the _Agias_ the band is dexterously used to heighten the effect of variety in the hair by alternately flattening and swelling it here and there. In neither head is there any sign of the use of the drill to work out the tufts of the hair; only the chisel was used.[2074]

Finally, the whole expression of these two ideal heads is one of force and energy, of heroic dignity tempered by pensiveness and pathos, which is, in the head from Olympia at least, even a little dramatic. Both heads, while ideal, show close observation of nature in modeling and expression; and both show the predilection of Lysippos for types in which force and energy predominate, and his indifference to the softer and more delicate types of manly beauty so characteristic of his contemporary, Praxiteles.

In the foregoing comparison, we have tacitly assumed that this marble head is from an athlete statue, and, moreover, that it, as the _Agias_, represents a victor in the pankration, though many have seen in it the representation not of a victor, but of a youthful Herakles.[2075] The swollen ears and the band in the hair might pass equally well for either, just as the fact that it was unearthed near the ruins of the Great Gymnasion (if it were necessary to assume that the statue once stood there) might be adduced as evidence for either interpretation; for statues of athletes as well as those of Herakles and Hermes (as we have shown in Ch. II)[2076] adorned palæstræ and gymnasia. That the head is of marble and slightly under life-size seems to lend some support also to the belief that it is a fragment of a statue of Herakles, on the assumption that statues of victors in the Altis were uniformly of bronze, an assumption, however, not supported by the facts, as will be shown in Chapter VII. So some have seen the heroic features of the youthful hero in the γοργόν of the eyes, the energetic forehead, closely cropped hair, muscular neck, and almost challenging inclination of the head seemingly corresponding with an energetic raising of the left shoulder.[2077] In Chapter III we saw that swollen ears were of little use in determining whether a given head belongs to the statue of a victor or to one of Herakles, since they formed no personal characteristic, but only a professional one common to athletes and to gods, if these latter were concerned with athletics.[2078] Where personal attributes are absent, it is often difficult, therefore, to determine whether an ideal athlete or Herakles is intended, for it may be the hero in the guise of the athlete, or an athlete in the guise of the hero. The head under discussion, then, may furnish merely another illustration of the process of assimilation of type which we have already discussed. Thus it is not surprising that some have regarded this head as that of a youthful Herakles. Yet such a view is wrong; for, apart from all considerations which we shall adduce to identify it with the Akarnanian pancratiast, and in the absence of distinguishing attributes, if we compare it with another Lysippan head from a statue generally recognized as that of a Herakles—the famous Pentelic marble one in Lansdowne House, London (Pl. 30 and Fig. 71),[2079] which Michaelis long ago characterized as “unmistakably in the spirit of Lysippos”—we can see how fundamentally different is the whole spiritual conception of the two, and how differently an athlete (even if highly idealized) and a hero are treated by the same sculptor. If we once recognize a victor in the head from Olympia, then the swollen ears, the fierce, barbarous look of the eyes, and the half-painful expression of the mouth, all concur in convincing us that we here have to do with a victor in boxing or the pankration, the two most brutal and dangerous contests.

[Illustration: FIG. 71.—Head of the Statue of Herakles (Pl. 30). Lansdowne House, London.]

IDENTIFICATION OF THE OLYMPIA HEAD.

Having established, then, the Lysippan character of the head and the probability that it comes from the statue of a boxer or pancratiast, we shall next discuss the evidence for identifying it with one of the monuments mentioned by Pausanias in his _periegesis_ of the Altis. He names only five statues of victors by Lysippos: those of Troilos,[2080] victor in the two- and four-horse chariot-races; of Philandridas[2081] and of Polydamas,[2082] victors in the pankration; of Cheilon,[2083] victor in wrestling, and of Kallikrates,[2084] victor in the hoplite-race. Of these, the only two which can come into consideration are those of the two pancratiasts; and one of these, that of Polydamas, can at once be eliminated; for this small head can have had nothing to do with the pretentious monument mentioned by Pausanias in these words: ὁ δὲ ἐπὶ τῷ βάθρῳ τῷ ὑψηλῷ Λυσίππου μέν ἐστιν ἔργον, μέγιστος δὲ ἁπάντων ἐγένετο ἀνθρώπων, κ. τ. λ. Fragments of the base of this monument have been recovered, and it stood in a part of the Altis[2085] too far removed from the spot where the statue of Philandridas stood, or from that where the marble head was found. Our choice is limited to the statue of the Akarnanian, the tenth in the series of 168 victors[2086] named by Pausanias in his first _ephodos_.

[Illustration: PLATE 30

Statue of Herakles. Lansdowne House, London.]

We can determine very closely the position of these first few statues in the Altis. Pausanias begins his enumeration ἐν δεξιᾷ τοῦ ναοῦ τῆς Ἥρας, in the northwest of the sacred enclosure.[2087] He is often loose in his employment of words to denote locations, and especially so in that of the terms ἐν δεξιᾷ and ἐν ἀριστερᾷ, which must sometimes be interpreted from the viewpoint of the spectator, and sometimes from that of a given monument. We shall show in Chapter VIII that these words in this connection must be taken as referring to the temple _pro persona_, and consequently to the southern side of the Heraion. The marble head was found in this neighborhood, in the wall of some late Byzantine huts behind the southern end of the stadion-hall of the Great Gymnasion, 23.50 meters north of its southeastern corner and 5 meters east of its back wall,[2088] and consequently very near the Heraion. Inasmuch as the inscribed tablet from the base of the statue of Troilos,[2089] the sixth statue mentioned by Pausanias, and the inscribed base of the monument of Kyniska,[2090] the seventh, were both found in the ruins of the Prytaneion nearby, and the basis of the statue of Sophios,[2091] the twenty-second in the series, was discovered also in this part of the Altis, in the bed of the Kladeos,[2092] we can conclude that all four monuments originally stood near together, and in the order named by Pausanias, along the southern side of the Heraion. The remarkably good preservation of the surface of the marble head points to the fact that it was set up in a sheltered place.[2093] Furthermore, the unfinished condition of the back hair, which is only roughly blocked out, so that not even the contour of the locks is indicated, shows that the statue was intended to be set up against a solid background, _i. e._, in front of a wall, niche, or column.[2094] From this fact we may conclude that the statue of Philandridas, and perhaps those of some of the other victors first mentioned by Pausanias, stood on the southern stylobate of the Heraion, over against the columns of the peristyle.

THE DATES OF PHILANDRIDAS AND LYSIPPOS.

The date of the victory of Philandridas is not recorded, but it probably must lie within the years of the activity of Lysippos, who made the statue.[2095] On the principle which has been sufficiently demonstrated in my monograph _de olympionicarum Statuis_, that statues of nearly contemporaneous victors were grouped together in the Altis, as well as those of the same family and state, or those who had been victorious in the same contest, I have already in that work[2096] proposed Ol. 102 or Ol. 103 (= 372 or 368 B. C.) as the probable date of his victory, as his statue stands among those of victors, none of whom could have won later than Ol. 104 (= 364 B. C.). The first six named by Pausanias are Eleans and the dates of their victories fall between Ols. 94 and 104 (= 404 and 364 B. C.); the sixth, Troilos, is known to have won his two victories in Ols. 102 and 103.[2097] None of the next seven Spartans—among whose statues that of Philandridas was placed—can be dated later than Ol. 97 (= 392 B. C.), while most of them belong to the close of the fifth century B. C. Sostratos of Sikyon won in the same contest in which Philandridas did in Ol. 104 (= 364 B. C.);[2098] and doubtless his two other known victories should be assigned to the two succeeding Olympiads. To bring Philandridas down as far as Ol. 107 (= 352 B. C.) is unwarranted, since no statue of so late a date stood in this vicinity. On the other hand, to place his victory earlier than Ol. 102, is also out of the question, owing to the inexpediency of dating Lysippos so early. Doubtless, therefore, his statue by Lysippos was placed in the Spartan group about the same time that the image of Troilos, by the same sculptor, was placed among the Eleans. This is an independent argument, then, for so early a date for Lysippos.[2099]

Percy Gardner, in the discussion of the date of this artist,[2100] has shown how slight is the evidence for any date later than 320 B. C. The date of the second Olympic victory of Cheilon of Patrai, whose statue was by Lysippos, can not be later than 320 B. C.[2101] Pausanias quotes the inscription on the base of the statue to the effect that Cheilon died in battle and was buried for his valor’s sake by the Achæan people. He infers the date of his death by reference to the date of Lysippos as either 338 B. C. (Chæroneia) or 322 B. C. (Lamia). In another passage, VII, 6.5, he says that the Olympic guide told him that Cheilon was the only Achæan who fought at Lamia. Gardner justly remarks that either of these dates, the two occasions in the lifetime of Lysippos when the Achæans took part in an important war, fall within the dates of the artist’s activity.[2102] The dates of the two hoplite victories of Kallikrates of Magnesia, on the Meander, whose statue was also the work of Lysippos, must be left indeterminate.[2103] Gardner also shows that the wish not to separate Lysippos from the _Apoxyomenos_ has been the real reason which has influenced so many archæologists to extend his activity to the end of the fourth century,[2104] and to explain away the evidence for an earlier date offered by the statue of Troilos, who won his second victory in 368 B. C. If we once for all give up the _Apoxyomenos_, the difficulty of an early dating disappears, as does also the theory that Skopas could have strongly influenced the youthful Lysippos as a master would influence a pupil, and it becomes clear that this influence must have been mutual, that of one great contemporary upon another. Although Lysippos worked longer, as is attested by his work for Alexander and his generals, he could have been but little if any younger than either Skopas or Praxiteles, from both of whom he learned. We have already quoted Homolle[2105] as saying that an analysis of the style of the _Agias_ discloses the mixed influences of Praxiteles and Skopas, as well as the independent work of Lysippos, in the pose, proportions, and whole type of the figure.

Lysippos was a great reformer in art, breaking away from Argive and Polykleitan traditions, even though he called the _Doryphoros_ as well as Nature his master, and though the influence of Polykleitos is visible in the body of the _Agias_, just as that of Skopas in the treatment of its forehead, eyes, and mouth, and in the intensity of its expression. Evidently he was strongly affected by the work of his great predecessors and contemporaries, but developed at the same time new and independent tendencies. Thus the _Philandridas_ must have been—just as the lost statue of Troilos—an early work of the master, whereas the _Agias_ was the work of his mature genius. The difference between the two can thus be explained by the lapse of time between them, and by the influences that surrounded the youthful artist; but the similarities between them are, at the same time, striking, and there is little resemblance in either to the _Apoxyomenos_. This is another link in the chain of evidence that the latter work could not have been produced by the same artist; for artists do not radically change their style after many years of work, and Lysippos must have been at least fifty years old when he created the _Agias_.

The identification of this marble head with that of the victor statue of the Akarnanian pancratiast by Lysippos raises two questions which we shall briefly examine: whether the statues in the Altis were ever made of marble, and whether Lysippos ever worked in that material. The first of these questions will be left for the following chapter; the second will be discussed in the present connection.

LYSIPPOS AS A WORKER IN MARBLE, AND STATUE “DOUBLES.”

To regard a marble statue as an original work of Lysippos, who has been looked upon almost universally as a sculptor in bronze exclusively, seems at first sight to be baseless. Pliny certainly classed Lysippos among the bronze-workers, for in the preface to his account of bronze-founders[2106] he tells us that this artist produced 1,500 statues, and doubtless we are to infer that the historian regarded them all as being made of metal. He further[2107] speaks of Lysippos’ contributions to the (_ars_) _statuaria_, and it seems clear that this term, as the modern title of Book XXXIV, is to be taken in its narrow sense of sculpture in bronze as opposed to _sculptura_,[2108] that in marble. How firmly the belief is established that Lysippos worked only in bronze can be seen from the following words of Overbeck: “_Zu beginnen ist mit wiederholter Hervorhebung der durchaus unzweifelhaften und wichtigen Tatsache dass Lysippos ausschliesslich Erzgiesser war._”[2109] That Lysippos was preëminently a bronze-worker, and that his ancient reputation was due chiefly to his bronze work, can not be doubted. But to say that he never essayed to produce works in marble, as so many other Greek artists did who were famed as bronze-workers,[2110] is, as one writer has lately expressed it, a _kindisches Vorurtheil_.[2111] That marble work was done in his studio, if not by his hand, is well attested by the reliefs from the base of the victor statue of Polydamas mentioned above, which have been generally referred to Lysippos’ pupils.[2112] These are too damaged to be used as exact evidence of his style, but the legs of Polydamas himself, in the central relief, so far as their contour can be made out, are thin and sinewy, as we should expect in Lysippan work, and this relief doubtless would have been regarded as the work of the master himself, if it had not been taken for granted that he worked only in bronze. But for the same assumption some critics would have seen an original from the hand of Lysippos in the statue of Agias at least, if not in the others of the Delphian group.[2113] It will be interesting to rehearse some of the arguments by which the statue of Agias has been adjudged a copy.[2114]

It has been generally assumed that the original group of statues at Pharsalos was of bronze (though we have no proof that it may not have been of marble), while the one at Delphi was copied almost, if not quite, simultaneously in marble[2115]—so faithfully, indeed, that even the proper marble support to the figure of Agias was omitted. While Homolle notes the absence of this support as evidence of the marble statue being an exact copy of the original bronze, Gardner argues that this proves a free imitation, where the support was not needed.[2116] The inexact modeling of the hair, since hair can not be rendered so perfectly in marble as in bronze, has been adduced as a sign that the marble statue was a copy of the bronze original. This in itself is a weak argument, since the slight and sketchy treatment of the hair of the _Hermes_ of Praxiteles—which is, for the most part, merely blocked out[2117]—might with just as good reason be used as evidence that that statue is only a copy, especially as we know that Praxiteles also worked in bronze.[2118] The omission of the artist’s signature on the base of the _Agias_ has also been taken to indicate that some pupil of Lysippos (Lysistratos, for example) did the work of transference in the master’s studio under his supervision and doubtless from his model.

Despite all such arguments, which prove little, it must be admitted that the careless finish of the Delphian statue is not what we should expect in a masterpiece by so renowned a sculptor as Lysippos, as the statue can not be said to be a first-rate work of art. But that it was made under the direct supervision of Lysippos can hardly be questioned. It seems reasonable to believe that Daochos, who employed the great artist in the one case, would not have trusted a mere copyist in the other, or one who was free to indulge his individual taste in details,[2119] especially as the statue was to be placed in so prominent a place as Delphi. He probably gave the orders for the two statues at the same time, and Lysippos must have had the oversight of the Delphian one. So it seems best to regard the statue of Agias as a “double,” and not as a copy in the later sense of the word. The custom of making such doubles goes back at least to the middle of the sixth century B. C. Thus the statue of the _Delian Apollo_ by Angelion and Tektaios, known as the “_Healer_” (Οὔλιος),[2120] had a “double” in both Delphi[2121] and Athens.[2122] Similarly the _Philesian Apollo_ of Branchidai near Miletos, by the elder Kanachos,[2123] had a double in Thebes known as the _Ismenian Apollo_, which Pausanias says differed from the one in Miletos neither in form nor size, but only in material, for it was of cedar-wood,[2124] while the Milesian one was of bronze. Furtwaengler[2125] has demonstrated that contemporary doubles of works by Polykleitos, Pheidias, and Praxiteles existed. The case of the statues of the athlete Agias at Pharsalos and at Delphi is paralleled by that of the Olympic victor Promachos, who had statues, probably alike, both at Olympia and in his native city Pellene.[2126] A double of the base of the _Nike_ of Paionios at Olympia was discovered at Delphi,[2127] and a fine head in the collection of Miss Hertz in Rome is from the same original.[2128] A Polykleitan head in the British Museum, similar to that of the _Westmacott Athlete_ (Pl. 19), seems to be a contemporary replica of an original of the fifth century B. C.[2129] Such examples (and many more could be cited) show the difference between contemporary “doubles” and the later copies of Greek masterpieces. The former are Greek originals in a very true sense, made, as we assume the _Agias_ was, under the direct supervision of noted sculptors. In this sense only the Delphian statue should be called a copy.

HEAD OF A STATUE OF A BOY FROM SPARTA, AND THE ART OF SKOPAS.

[Illustration: FIG. 72.—Marble Head of a Boy, found near the Akropolis, Sparta. In Private Possession in Philadelphia, U. S. A.]