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Paestan Pottery: a Revision and a Supplement*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2013

A. D. Trendall
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Extract

Since the end of 1935, when my Paestan Pottery was written, well over a hundred vases belonging to this fabric have come to light. Many of them have been found as a result of excavations carried out in recent years in and around Paestum itself, notably at Arenosola, Oliveto Citra, Altavilla and Pontecagnano, and are therefore of considerable importance as confirming the location of the manufacturing centre in Paestum. Other previously unknown vases have come into the market from private collections and several ‘lost’ vases have reappeared. Further, an opportunity to revisit during 1951 most of the ‘major collections in the museums of Western Europe and America has enabled me to add several vases to the list as well as to correct a number of errors. There have also been some important new publications on the subject. In 1935 Marzullo published a preliminary study of the painted tombs discovered at Paestum three years earlier (Tombe dipinte scoperte nel territorio pestano), and a fuller and better illustrated account of the pottery finds, together with a publication of related material from other nearby sites, appeared in two articles by Giovanni Patroni, entitled ‘Vasi Pestani’, in the Rassegna Storica Salernitana ii (1939), pp. 221–258 with figs. 1–37, and in (1940), 3–36 with figs. 38–72, to which, for the sake of convenience, I shall in future refer as VP. A bell-krater acquired by the Ashmolean Museum in 1942 was published by Beazley in AJA xlviii (1944), pp. 357–366, in an article entitled ‘A Paestan Vase’, in which he made some important observations on the workshop of Asteas and Python. The time, therefore, seems ripe for the issue of a supplement to my original publication in order to incorporate the new vases, of which many of the most significant are here illustrated, and to make such revisions to the text and lists of attributions as seem called for in the light of the new evidence now to hand.

Type
Research Article
Information
Papers of the British School at Rome , Volume 20 , November 1952 , pp. 1 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © British School at Rome 1952

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References

1 Most notable among these are: Hope 268–270 and 278. now Sydney 48·05, 48·06, W5 and 48·04 respectively; Hope 280, now in Dundee; the Disney krater, now Cambridge 43·7; and the bell-krater formerly in the Vatican Library, now Reading University 51·7·11.

2 Reprinted from Nachrichten von der Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen, Phil. Hist. Kl. III, 7, 1939, pp. 199–230Google Scholar.

3 I owe my knowledge of this vase in the first instance to Sir John Beazley. Unfortunately the Fienga Collection was inaccessible in May 1951, so I have not seen the original. From the description it seemed to be the work of Python, but from photographs kindly given to me later by Dr. Karl Lehmann in New York I now realise that the vase belongs to the Asteas Group (see below, p. 33). However, in order to avoid a last-minute rearrangement of catalogue numbers, I have left it here.

4 I owe my knowledge of this vase in the first instance to the kindness of Professor H. R. W. Smith.

5 To the list of his works given there on p. 72 we may add the following:—

Neck-amphorae Lekane

(i) Vienna 479. (a) Woman and bird on column; (b) two youths. Necks: sirens.

(ii) New York 91.1.455. (a) Youth and woman with a dog between them;(b)two youths. Necks: female heads.

bell-kraters

(iii)Louvre K 239. (a) Europa on the bull with three youths around; (b) three youths. Repainted.

(iv)Paris, Musée Rodin 963. (a) Thiasos; (b)three youths. CVA pl. 34, 3–4; JHS 1952, p. 156.

(v) Haverford College, Pa. (a) Maenad with thyrsus;(b)draped youth.

Lekane

(vi) Frankfurt, Schaal pl. 57 d. Women, Erotes, warrior and silen.

Oenochoe(shape 2)

(vii)Louvre K 489. Seated woman with head thrown back.

The bell-krater Vienna 917 (SK 215,55)with(a)three youths, one seated and holding the bridle of a horse, and a woman with a hydria, b three youths, to which Beazley refers as probably by the Parrish painter, is certainly by his hand, although it has been to some extent repainted.

6 NdS 1913, Supplemento, p. 44.

7 Trendall, Frühit. Vasen, no. 237, pl. 14; FR, 110.

8 Séchan, Ėtudes sur la Tragidie, pp. 378–388, figs. 112–4;PP, p. 59, n. 4, where the calyx-krater in Ferrara is added to his list. A further addition is a Campanian neckamphora of the AV Group recently acquired by the Nicholson Museum, Sydney (51·17), which shows Iphigenia with the key standing in front of the altar and holding out the letter to Pylades. Louvre K 404, despite Séchan's doubts, should also be included in the general list of IT vases.

9 The altar may be a reminiscence of the Tarentine custom of offering heroic sacrifice to the Atreidai and others, and on one special day a θυσία to the Agamemnonidai. See Nock, A. D., ‘The Cult of Heroes’, in Harvard Theological Review xxxvii (1944), p. 146Google Scholar, and Giannelli, Culti e miti della Magna Grecia, 42 f.

10 PP, p. 15, n. 25; now published by Sestieri, in Dioniso vii (1939), p. 194Google Scholar, see Beazley, AJA 1944, p. 365.

11 Inv. 49·01.

12 I owe photographs of this vase and permission to reproduce them to the kindness of Dr. Ciro Drago.

13 To the bibliography of phlyax vases given on p. xiv of Paestan Pottery the following additions should be made:—

Simon, A. K. H., Comicae Tabellae (Emsdetten, 1938Google Scholar).

Bieber, M., The History of the Greek and Roman Theater (Princeton, 1939)Google Scholar; here cited as Bieber, HT.

Olivieri, A., Frammenti delta Commedia fliacica, 2nd ed., Naples, 1947Google Scholar.

T. B. L. Webster, ‘South Italian Vases and Attic Drama’ in CQ 1948, pp. 15–27.

Webster, T. B. L., ‘The Masks of Greek Comedy’ in Bull. Rylands Library xxxii, 1949, pp. 97–133CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

T. B. L. Webster, ‘Masks on Gnathia Vases’ in JHS 1951, pp. 222–232.

Jones, Frances F. (compiler), The Theater in Ancient Art (Catal. of an Exhibition in the Art Museum. Princeton University, 10 December 1951–6 January 1952Google Scholar).

On the stages on phlyax vases, see in particular Bieber, HT, p. 298, and Wuilleumier, Tarente, pp. 617 ff. Additional illustrations to those given on PP, pp. 26–27, will be found in: (i) a bell-krater in Würzburg showing an old man giving a spear to a seated warrior—low stage supported on two columns; (ii) a bell-krater by the same painter in the Hirsch Collection, New York (no. 703), with an old woman coming out of a door to greet a whitehaired man on a low, unsupported stage structure.

14 Good examples of the close imitation of late fifth century Attic r.f. may be seen in a group of calyx-kraters, all by the same hand:—

1. Madrid 11022 (L. 587). (a) Eros flying to crown a banqueter with a bead-chain, to r. a bearded silen with a kantharos; (b) three youths.

2. B.M. F 37 (a) Two banqueters at cottabos, and Eros flying with a bead-chain; (b) two youths.

3. Syracuse 36209, from Syracuse (Fusco). CVA, IV, E, pl. 7, 4–5. (a) Bearded man approaching a serpent-guarded tree in the presence of a woman; (b) fight between three warriors.

In all three vases the clay is a rich orange-red and there is great similarity in pattern (note especially the dots inthe chequer squares) shape, in the treatment of the hair and in many other details.

Very close in style are three other vases of a paler pinkish clay:—

4. Bell-krater, Madrid 11030 (L. 233). (a) Woman dancing to the accompaniment of a seated woman playing the flute, bearded silen seated in front of standing woman playing the flute; (b) three dancing women. Dotted chequers are again used with the meanders.

5. Calyx-krater, Syracuse 37171, from Lentini. CVA, IV E, pl. 7, 1. (a) Seated and standing women at cottabos with flying Eros; (b) silen pursuing maenad.

6. Calyx-krater, Vatican S 9 (a) Pan, maenad, Eros and seated woman, (b) two draped youths.

To the above list may also be added:—

7. Skyphos, Boston 03.824, from Campania, (a) Agaev with the head of Pentheus preceded by a maenad; (b) two maenads with thyrsi, swinging a kid between them.

The style is a little cruder than that of the other six vases, but the skyphos certainly belongs here.

It is probable that in origin these vases are Campanian of the early fourth century and that the two found in Sicily are imports rather than local products. The last four must be about contemporary with the early vases of the Dirce Painter, a nearer imitation of whose work may be seen in a bell-krater from Lentini, Syracuse 37059, with (a) Orestes on the altar with two Furies; (b) two youths, mostly missing (CVA, IV E, Pl. 10, 1); cf. also the calyx-krater 47102 (CVA, IV E, pl. 5) with (a) three maenads and a bearded silen; (b) two draped youths. I hope to deal more fully with the whole question of the so-called ‘Sicilian’ vases elsewhere; meantime see also Bulletin van de Vereniging tot Bevordering der Kennis van de antike Beschaving, The Hague, 24–26 (1949–51), p. 35.

15 I owe my knowledge of the Toulouse and Haverford vases in the first instance to Dr. von Bothmer.

16 1945·43. Report of the Visitors to the Ashmolean Museum 1945, p. 12, pl. IIa

17 The lost bell-krater formerly in the Vatican Library (Passeri, pls. 123–4) is now Reading University 51.7.11, and is here no. 172, pl. XIIIb; Hope 270 is now Sydney W 5 (no. 170); Hope 271 and 273, formerly in Dunecht, are now in Los Angeles (nos. 156 and 171); Hope 272 and 278 are now Sydney 47.04 and 48.04 respectively (nos. 151 and 157, pls. XIIb and c); Hope 274 is now Dunedin E 48.261 (no. 182); Hope 280 is in Dundee (no. 153). Hope 276, 277 and 279 still remain unaccounted for; nos. 276 and 279 passed into the Howard collection, reappearing on the market at Sotheby's in 1929 (Sale Cat. nos. 86 and 84 respectively), since when they have passed from sight.

18 Brommer not unreasonably confuses this vase with Hope 280 (now in Dundee) but, though similar, they are not the same; the Mannheim silen raises one foot from the ground and carries a thyrsus, his Dundee counterpart stands upright and carries a situla.

19 The writer of the article in AA erroneously states that the vase was acquired by the Naples Museum.

20 So called after their first classification by Pagen-stecher in Bulletin de la Societé Archéologique d'Alexandrie no. 14 (1912), pp. 229 ff. For a more recent list (with other references) see also Greifenhagen, Text to CVA, Braunschweig, p. 44 and pl. 34. Many further additions could be made.

21 On vases with applied red figures, see in particular Picard BCH 1911, p. 202; Pryce, , CVA, B.M. viiGoogle Scholar, text to IV Eb and pls. 1–4; Trendall, PP, p. 108; Mustilli, NdS 1937, pp. 144 ff.; Beazley, Etruscan Vase-Painting, chap. XII, especially pp. 225–7. Another ‘Paestanising’ example is the squat lekythos Princeton 37.254 showing a youth with thyrsus and wreath.

22 See VP, figs. 5–14 and NdS 1937, 146–7.

23 For the subject and other representations of it see also Beazley, Etruscan Vase-Painting, pp. 40 ff.

24 There is one subtraction. The bail-amphora Madrid 11479 (PP, no. 288) is Campanian, by the CA Painter.

25 See Beazley, JHS 1943, pp. 91 f.

26 See Trendall, , ‘Two skyphoid-pyxides in Moscow’, Bull. Ant. Besch., The Hague, 1949–1951, p. 35Google Scholar.

27 Beazley, op. cit. pp. 102–3. To the works of the Siamese Painter may be added: (i) a neck-amphora in New York (L. 1591), with (a) a winged figure, (b) a shrine (?). The female head on the neck of (a) associates this vase with (ii) a bail-amphora, Reading 50.5.5, (iii) a skyphos, Johns Hopkins University 4038, and (iv) a lekane-lid, Manchester IV E 14, all of which are decorated with similar heads. Also (v) a bail-amphora in the Fienga Collection at Nocera del Pagani with (a) warrior, and on the neck a female head, and (vi) a bell-krater in the Melbourne National Gallery with (a) Hermes and a woman, (b) two women. By the same hand as B.M. F 492 (which has 21 heads on the obverse, a row of twelve over one of nine) is a bell-krater in Naples (H. 925; inv. 82595) with (a) six female heads, (b) female head.

28 This vase should follow no. 133 in the list