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The Hippolytus Sarcophagus from Trinquetaille

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

J. B. Ward Perkins
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Extract

One of the finest Attic sarcophagi of its class, and certainly one of the most striking pieces to have reached the western provinces, is the well-known Hippolytus sarcophagus which was found in 1891 at Trinquetaille, across the river from Aries, and which is now one of the chief ornaments of the Musée Romain in that city (pl. 1). There is no need to describe it in detail, since it has been fully published, with good photogravure reproductions of all four sides, by Robert, and again in more summary form, by Espérandieu. It will be enough in the present context to note that it is a typical example of what Rodenwaldt, in his penetrating discussion of the evolution of the Attic kline-sarcophagus, has shown to be an advanced and presumably, therefore, relatively late variant within that series. The lid, with a single male figure reclining on an embroidered mattress upon a couch with animal-headed mounts, has altered very little from the prototype; but on the body all that remains of the Caryatid figures that once supported the couch at the four angles is the pair of vestigial pedestals at either end of the recessed moulding along the base of the rear face. The mouldings, too, a delicately carved acanthus scroll along the upper border, an elaborately lobed leaf-and-tongue motif along the re-entrant surface behind the line of the heads, and a panel of conventional bay-wreath ornament along the lower border, all of these, with their very shallow relief and fluid surfaces, represent an altogether more advanced stage of development than the boldly cut, purposeful architectural mouldings of earlier practice. In these later Attic sarcophagi the emphasis has shifted decisively from the architectural framework of the design to the figures themselves, which now form a virtually uninterrupted frieze round the four sides of the body.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 46 , Issue 1-2 , November 1956 , pp. 10 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © J. B. Ward Perkins 1956. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 The photographs of the Aries sarcophagus with which this note is illustrated were taken by M. Jacques Latour, Director of the Musées d'Arles, to whom the writer is also indebted for permission to publish them. The photos of the Agrigento sarcophagus were kindly supplied by Dr. P. Griffo.

2 Robert, C., Die antiken Sarkophagreliefs, III, 2, 194Google Scholar, no. 160, pl. 50 (the provenance is wrongly given as ‘near Saintes-Maries’). E. Espérandieu, Recueil général des bas-reliefs de la Gaule romaine, 1, 110, no. 133 (good photographs of the front and left end; a poor photograph of the back).

3 Rodenwaldt, G., Jahrb. Deutsch. Arch. Inst. 45 (1930), 116–189Google Scholar.

4 e.g. Robert, o.c., 11, no. 9, pl. 3 (from Kephisia). Although the form with couch-legs (e.g. Rodenwaldt, o.c., Abb. 4–6, in the Kerameikos) might be taken to be the natural and logical prototype of the whole series, there are grounds (ibid., 138 f.) for believing that it is a rationalization of an existing type.

5 The majority of this marble was undoubtedly quarried from the slopes of Mount Pentelikon. But it is not confined to Pentelikon, and the term ‘Pentelic’ is perhaps better reserved for the familiar Pentelic statuary marble of antiquity.

6 Kouroniotis, Eleusis, 1934, p. 76, fig. 44. I owe this reference to the kindness of Professor Matz.

7 e.g., Robert, o.c., 11, no. 23, pls. XI, XII; no. 47, pl. XXII; no. 69, pls. XXVIII, XXIX; no. no, pl. XLV; III, no. 144, pl. XLIV; no. 216, pl. LXX; no. 220, pl. LXXIII (an unusually clear example of unfinished work); and many others.

8 ibid., 111, 178, no. 152, pl. XLVII.

9 The relief of the back is, however, far less pronounced than the strong cross-light of pl. 11, 2, would suggest.

10 Unpublished.

11 Inv. no. 1245. For permission to photograph and to reproduce this lid I am indebted to the Director, Dr. Ch. Makaronas.

12 Rodenwaldt, o.c. (n. 3), 132–4, Abb. 8–11. The front and left-hand end of the body are fully carved, the other two sides are only roughed out. The head is a portrait.

13 I have not had an opportunity of confirming in person this possibility, which had not occurred to me when I was last in Aries. Both Miss Eve Rutter, who has re-examined the lid with this point in mind, and M. Latour, who has kindly taken a number of detailed photographs of the marble, confirm that the indications of the cutting are fully consistent with such an interpretation. It is, indeed, difficult to explain in any other terms the deep rectangular cut-away (not shown in fig. 1) in the mattress to the right of the cushion on which the surviving figure reclines.

14 ibid., II, no. 9, pl. III.

15 Robert, o.c., 11, no. 25, pls. XIV, XV (drawing at p. 35); now in the Museo Capitolino. The marble is Pentelic (not Italian, as stated by Stuart Jones, Catal., p. 77).

16 JHS LIII (1933), 181–192.

17 Pietrogrande, A. L., Africa Italiana III (1930), 107–140Google Scholar.

18 o.c., 182, n. 10: ‘Numerous examples prove that it was no hindrance to export for back or sides to be unfinished. Hence there is no reason to assume with de Jerphanion, G., Orient. Christ. XXVIII, pp. 223 ff.Google Scholar, that the couch-sarcophagus of S. Lorenzo was made, or worked over, in Rome.’

19 JRS XLI (1951), 89–104. There are many such architectural pieces lying roughed-out beside the harbours at the Tiber mouth.

20 ibid.; also IRT 264, 799–804.

21 Breccia, Ev., Municipalité d'Alexandrie: le Musée Gréco-romain, 1922–3 (Alexandria, 1924), 10–19Google Scholar, pls. VII–XIII; idem, 1925–1931 (Bergamo, 1932), 30–2, pls. XVIII–XIX. The writer hopes to be able to undertake a study of the Proconnesian garland sarcophagi in the near future.

22 From Tripoli, or possibly Seleucia; Mendel, G., Musées Imperiaux Ottomans: catal. des sculptures grecques, romaines et byzantines, III (1914), 408–12Google Scholar, no. 1169; also Jahrb. Deutsch. Arch. Inst., 45 (1930), 177, Abb. 53–4.

23 Mendel, o.c., 1 (1912), 109–114, no. 26; compare the roughed-out garland design on the back with those on the Alexandrian series.