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Melian Aftermath

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

P. Jacobsthal
P. Jacobsthal
Affiliation:
Christ Church, Oxford
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Extract

The number of Melian reliefs has slightly increased in the last few years.

On 5–6th July, 1938, Messrs. Sotheby sold a piece—it is No. 184 in the Sale Catalogue—of which little is known. J. D. Beazley, who drew my attention to it, tells me that most of it was modern plaster: only a small part was antique, it showed something of a draped female figure on an animal's back, Helle or a Nereid.

A fragment of a winged Artemis, figured in Melische Reliefs, p. 26, fig. 3, after a good drawing by Schoene, was rediscovered in one of the drawers of the Athenian National Museum by Mrs. Papaspyridi-Karousou, and is figured in BCH 61, 1937, p. 354, fig. 1.

The dancer (no. 42), the whereabouts of which were unknown to me in 1931, is now, as Mr. Chr. Karousos kindly informs me, in the Nomikos collection in Thera.

Of Melian reliefs—in a wider sense (see Melische Reliefs, p. 89 sq.)—I mention a cock, a Sphinx and a Gorgo, published by Mrs. Papaspyridi-Karousou in Arch. Deltion 1934/35, p. 30, fig. 15; they were found together in an Argive tomb which is dated by its other contents to the second quarter of the fifth century roughly—a welcome date for these conservative works.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Hellenic Studies , Volume 59 , Issue 1 , 1939 , pp. 65 - 70
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1939

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References

1 I am indebted to Mr. C. D. Bicknell for a photograph of the relief.

1a Mr.Vlasto, M. in Le Messager d'Athènes, 20th July, 1934Google Scholar, says ‘Thrace.’

2 MissRichter, G., in Metropolitan Museum Bulletin, 27, 1932, p. 45CrossRefGoogle Scholar, has published it, and made some important statements on the technique of Melian reliefs; I owe the photograph to her kindness. Other important observations on the technique of koroplasts have been recently made by Dr.Jastrow, Elisabeth, Opuscula Archaeologica (ed. Institutum Romanum Regni Sueciae), vol. ii, 1, pp. 1 ffGoogle Scholar. As far as Melian reliefs are concerned (see p. 16), her treatment of the dancers is correct. On the three Oresteia plaques she is less convincing: she is right in saying that no. 1, pl. 1 was moulded from no. 2, pl. 2, the largest and sharpest of the three; but the difference between the ‘original,’ no. 2, and no. 94, pl. 53 (angle of horse head, length of Pylades' forearm, etc.), cannot be explained by remodelling of a mechanical copy.

3 See Report of the Ashmolean Museum 1938, pl. V, p. 18Google Scholar.

4 Thomas Burgon (1797–1858): see Dictionary of National Biography, Suppl. I, 325Google Scholar.

5 It will be published by Mr. N. Kondoleon; I owe the knowledge of the piece to Mr. Chr. Karousos. Three other pieces in Greek private collections are mentioned by Mr.Vlasto, M. in Le Messager d'Athènes, 20th July, 1934Google Scholar; I was unable to obtain descriptions or photographs from their owners.

6 Poulsen, V. H., Der strenge Stil (Acta Archaeologica vii, 1937, 14)Google Scholar, has been misled by Dr. Welter's thesis that the Melian reliefs were made in Corinth. Dr. Welter's reasons seem to be as follows: (1) that my arguments (Melische Reliefs, p. 153) are not conclusive; (2) that Melian—and Aeginetan—clay cannot be fired hard; (3) that clay and technique resemble those of Corinthian terracottas. As long as Dr. Welter does not state his case explicitly nor refute my thesis of Melian origin, going into details of style, I cannot take this for more than a ‘schone Vermutung’—to use Mr. Poulsen's words.

7 See Hartwig, , Meisterschalen, p. 438Google Scholar; Pfuhl, , Die Anfänge der griechischen Bildniskunst pp. 18 ff.Google Scholar, Robert, , Die Masken der neueren attischen Komödie (HWPr.) p. 19Google Scholar. The Priam (fig. 41), by the way, is from the Vivenzio hydria (J. D. Beazley, Der Kleophradesmaler, no. 55), and not, as Robert says, by the Meidias painter; and the Pelias, who in Robert's drawing (fig. 42) looks like a Roman portrait in a eighteenth-century book, is taken from the Pistoxenos painter's calyx krater (not ‘olla’) in Corneto, badly figured in Annali, 1876 (not 1873), pl. F.

8 Melische Reliefs, p. 167.

9 Münchener Jahrbuch, 1912, pp. 142, 143Google Scholar; JdI 42, 1927, p. 136Google Scholar; Die Antike iv, 38Google Scholar.

10 JdI 47, 1932. P. 157Google Scholar.

11 Robert, , Die antiken Sarkophag-Reliefs iii, 3, nos. 315Google Scholar (Reinach, , Rép. des reliefs, iii, p. 277Google Scholar Festschrift Arndt, p. 26); 316 (Reinach, loc. cit. iii, p. 433; Festschrift Arndt, p. 27); 317; 320 (Amelung, , Die Skulpturen des Vatikanischen Museums, i, no. 457, pl. 65Google Scholar).

12 Espérandieu ix, no. 6707; Reinach, , Rép. de la statuaire iv, pp. 252, 255Google Scholar (‘Niobide ou Cassandre’!); Phot. Arch. Seminar Marburg, 1366; not mentioned by Studniczka, Artemis und Iphigenie. Height about O·60 m.; local limestone. The man's right foot and part of his left leg preserved. The statue corresponds in size—once also about 1·20 m.—technique of back and basis to that of Medea, Espérandieu, l.c., i, 143; Reinach l.c. ii, 507, 8; Bollettino d'Arte xxx, 1937, pp. 304–5Google Scholar. Both were found at Aries without more exact indication of the precise spot: it is not unlikely that they once stood in the theatre—illustrations of famous tragedies.

13 Melische Reliefs, nos. 104, 105.

14 Id. p. 168.

15 Beazley, J. D., DLZ 1931, p. 2133Google Scholar, with convincing arguments, pointed out that 440 B.C. was too early a date for the mature phase of the Melian reliefs; see also Richter, G., Metr. Mus. Bull., 27, 1932, 44, n. 1Google Scholar.

16 I keep to the traditional interpretation; Robert, 22. HWPr pp. 11, 12, has referred the picture to the story of Laodameia.