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On the Thermon Metopes
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 October 2013
Extract
The principal series of metopes from Thermon has been familiar for so long that further discussion of them may seem unnecessary. I hope, however, that the following pages are justified by the collective result of the small observations which they contain, if not by any single one of these. There is little of a general nature to be said after Koch's excellent article in Ath. Mitt., 1914.
I. Chelidon and Aedon. (Antike Denkmäler, ii., Pl. L, 1 (Soteriades). Photographs of details, Ath. Mitt., 1914, Pls. XIII, XIV (Koch)).
In the first place, a word as to the technique, the surprising elaborateness of which calls for more close attention than it has hitherto received. An interesting point is that the contours of the female flesh are drawn in bright red, the same as is used for the inscription, and for many details of dress. This use of red outlines for female flesh occurs, though not commonly, on Corinthian vases—on hydriae in the Louvre (E. 695) and in Dresden, where the faces and bodies of the sirens under the side handles are outlined in this way. It is found also in Attic vase painting—in two Sophilos fragments and in the fragment of similar style, from the Acropolis, with Pandrosos and Poseidon. The Corinthianising character of these has long been recognised, and the usage seems to be a subtlety which vase painters occasionally borrowed from the free painting of the time. On the other hand, male flesh in all the metopes is consistently outlined with black; the reason for the distinction is not easy to see, but it is possible that the artist was in search of equivalents for rendering the colours proper to the sexes—brown outlined with black for the male being used to balance white outlined with red for the female. In any case, the distinction was carefully maintained and was evidently felt to be significant.
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- Copyright © The Council, British School at Athens 1926
References
page 124 note 1 Akropolisvasen, Pl. XXVI. Jahrbuch des Arch. Inst., 1898, Pl. I.
page 124 note 2 Akropolisvasen, text, p. 63, No. 585.
page 125 note 1 Ath. Mitt., 1899, p. 371.
page 125 note 2 Johansen, , Vases Sicyoniens, Pl. XXXIII, 1, d.Google Scholar
page 125 note 3 Geometric: fragment from Prinia, , Annuario, i. p. 73, Fig. 14.Google Scholar Vases from Arcadia, in Candia. Protogeometric: Candia 371, from Kourtes.
page 125 note 4 Rumpf, , Die Wandmalereien in Veii, Diss., Leipzig, 1917.Google Scholar
page 125 note 5 Monumenti Antichi, xxv., Pl. XVI; on the date of this plaque v. infra. Also the doubling of the patterns at the base of the dress, the inner border being a tongue pattern, is similar in the metope and in the Gorgon plaque.
page 125 note 6 Heldensage, p. 155, note 1.
page 125 note 6bis Mr. Forsdyke of the British Museum and Dr. Kunze of the German Institute, who examined the metope with me, are kind enough to allow me to say that they agree with me in this matter.
page 126 note 1 I do not feel sure that the curved lines about the neck, which suggest the chin and lower lips of an open mouth, are part of the painting.
page 127 note 1 Jahreshefte, 1911, xiv., p. 28.
page 129 note 1 Albizzati, , Vasi Antichi dipinti del Vaticano, fasc, ii, p. 46, Fig. 14.Google Scholar
page 130 note 1 E.g. Coll. Somzée, Pls. XLII, XLIII (Pfuhl, Fig. 71), (Brussels Corpus, i. Pl. IV).
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page 130 note 2 E.g. Mon. Piot, xx. Pl. XVI (Louvre E. 638 bis).
British Museum, B. 39.
Jahrbuch, 1892, Pl. I. Brussels Corpus, i. Pl. V, 2.
Louvre E. 643 (Album I, Pl. LI).
Whole figures Berlin 1655, F.R. iii. Pl. LII; Florence 3755.
page 130 note 3 Protocorinthian: Johansen Pls. XXXI, XXXIX, XLI, 5.
Early Corinthian: round aryballos in Delos 6194, 190 (whole figure).
Alabastron in Syracuse (Megara Hyblaea Tomb 501), detail, Fig. 3.
Alabastron in Philadelphia.
Transitional to later Corinthian type: Alabastra, Louvre C.A. 1427.
Vienna, Oest. Mus. 84 (Masner, p. 8, Fig. 5).
Louvre A. 464 (Album I, Pl. XVI). It is impossible to judge the details of the Gorgoneion on the aryballos from Gela, Johansen, Pl. XXXIV, 2; the drawing either in the original or in the publication seems slightly confused.
page 130 note 4 The aryballos in Delos mentioned in the previous note is the only early example in which the hair is not treated in this way. The hair seems to be omitted in the Syracuse vase, Johansen, Pl. XLI, 5.
page 131 note 1 Most recently by Van Buren, , Archaic Fictile Revetments, P. 159.Google Scholar
page 131 note 2 Πρακτικά, 1911, p. 175.
page 131 note 3 Dickins, , Cat. Acrop. Mus. 701.Google ScholarSchrader, , Archaische Marmor-Skulpturen im Akropolis-Museum zu Athen, p. 5 ff.Google Scholar
page 132 note 1 Cf. Buschor, in Ath. Mitt., 1922, p. 54.Google Scholar
page 132 note 2 The connection of the earliest antefixes, etc., with the metopes has been convincingly proved by Koch, , Ath. Mitt., 1914, 237 ff.Google Scholar
page 132 note 3 Jahrbuch, 1901, p. 20, No. 1. Poulsen, Orient, Fig. 178.