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Some Early Evidence for the Use of the Running Drill

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 September 2013

A. F. Stewart
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Extract

The publication of Sheila Adam's lively and closely argued study of the technique of Greek sculpture has aroused considerable controversy; not the least disputed of her views was that the running drill, ‘the only major technical change which occurs in Greek sculpture of the Classical Period’, was not introduced until the second quarter of the fourth century B.C., a full seventy years or more after Blümel's date for its invention. Although such examination as I have been able to make of extant Greek originals from this period suggests to me that Adam was correct in concluding that the tool was not in general use until after c. 370, there does seem to be some evidence that sculptors were experimenting with it for about twenty to thirty years beforehand.

Type
Research Article
Information
Annual of the British School at Athens , Volume 70 , November 1975 , pp. 199 - 201
Copyright
Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1975

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References

1 The Technique of Greek Sculpture in the Archaic and Classical Periods (BSA suppl. iii (1966); see, for example, the review by Richter, G. M. A., AJA lxxii (1968) 393.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Adam, op. cit. 57; Blümel, C., Griechische Bildhauerarbeit (JdI Erg xi (1927) 15).Google Scholar In Greek Sculptors at Work (1955) 37 Blümel is less precise, mentioning only ‘the second half of the fifth century’; for a summary of other views see Adam, op. cit. 64–5. Adam's findings are doubted by Richter, loc. cit., and by, among others, e.g. R. Wittkower (Slade Lectures on the Technique of Sculpture, (1971).

3 Helbig4 2256 with bibliography; Inst. Neg. (Rome) lxvi. 2812.

4 e.g. around the right calf of the youth on the Ilissos stele, Athens NM. 869 (Adam, op. cit. 122 and pl. 69a).

5 See Adam, op. cit. 62–3 for a description and definition of the technique. Although both the ‘Aura’ and the Burlington torso show signs of secondary tooling, probably from a cleaning-up in Roman times, there is nothing to say that the drill channels discussed here are not original. In weathering and patination they correspond, as far as I can tell, with the unretouched surfaces of the two statues, and there are no signs of the coarse rasp-work visible in patches elsewhere (e.g. on the left thigh of the ‘Aura’ and the abdomen of the ‘Nereid’, PLATES 26, a, 27, b) along their edges or even near their sides.

6 AJA xxxvii (1933) pl. 36, 1; J. Travlos, Pictorial Dictionary of Ancient Athens fig. 671.

7 Private communication, 1972. I thank Professor Harrison for allowing me to use this information.

8 Paus. i. 26. 7. For Kallimachos' career see Richter, Sculpture and Sculptors 185.

9 Brunn-Bruckmann 747/8 (Ashmole); Schlörb, Timotheos (JdI Erg xxii (1965) 64–6, fig. 53 (with bibliography).

10 Cf. Adam, op. cit. 63, fig. 8(b).

11 NM., unnumbered. Schlörb, op. cit. fig. 15.

12 IG iv2 1, 102; A. Burford, The Greek Temple Builders at Epidaurus 54–5, 212.

13 Op. cit. 32–5.

14 Cf. Burford, op. cit. 55; Arnold, D., Die Polykletnachfolge (JdI Erg xxv (1969) 122Google Scholar; G. Roux, L'Architecture de l'Argolide 129–30. A late dating is also favoured by N. Yalouris, who is about to republish the sculptures.

15 J. F. Crome, Die Skulpturen des Asklepiostempels von Epidauros no. 1, pls. 1–4; Schlörb, op. cit. pl. 8.