The Place of Vase-Painting in Greek Art

1951 ◽  
Vol 46 ◽  
pp. 151-159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Robertson
Keyword(s):  
Archaic Period ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Vase Painting ◽  
Greek Art ◽  
Detailed Work

‘The vases of the classical period are but the reflection of classical beauty; the vases of the archaic period are archaic beauty itself.’ So Beazley; an indisputable and valuable truth, but a truth that needs some explanation. In spite of all the detailed work that has been done in the last fifty years and more on the development of Greek vase-painting and its relation to other arts, its nature still remains something of a problem. The issue is confused, of course, by the fact that vase-paintings are almost our only original Greek drawings—almost the only key-hole through which we can peep at archaic and classical painting—and this gives them an importance independent of their intrinsic worth.

Odysseus on the Niobid Krater

1989 ◽  
Vol 109 ◽  
pp. 191-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy J. McNiven
Keyword(s):  
Classical Period ◽  
Mural Painting ◽  
Vase Painting ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
New Developments ◽  
History Of ◽  
Greek Art

The Niobid krater in Paris (Louvre G341) is not one of the masterpieces of Greek vase painting. The vase is not even one of the best works of the artist, who receives his name, the Niobid Painter, from the rare depiction of Apollo and Artemis killing the children of Niobe on the reverse. The vase is, however, one of the touchstones of the history of ancient Greek art. The Niobid krater has this distinction because it is the earliest contemporaneous witness to the new developments in mural painting in the Early Classical Period, developments best understood from the descriptions of the traveler Pausanias six centuries later. The actual quality of the Niobid krater is therefore secondary to its documentary value.Since the krater's discovery in 1881, most discussion has focused on the iconography of the scene on the obverse, showing a group of warriors with Athena (PLATE IIa). The ambiguity of the scene comes from the large number of figures and the lack of action or iconographical evidence to help in their identification. Of the 11 figures, only Herakles (figure 6 on PLATE IIb), with his club and lionskin and Athena (4) in her aegis and helmet are clearly identifiable.

THE RETURN OF THE PIPERS: IN SEARCH OF NARRATIVE MODELS FOR THE AITION OF THE QVINQVATRVS MINVSCVLAE

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Kamila Wysłucha
Keyword(s):  
Archaic Period ◽  
Vase Painting ◽  
Augustan Poetry ◽  
Archaic Greece ◽  
Narrative Model

Abstract The article argues that the famous story about the strike, exile and return of the Roman aulos players, which is recorded in the sixth book of Ovid's Fasti and referred to by other Latin and Greek sources, is based on a narrative model that already existed in Greece in the Archaic period. The study draws parallels between the tale of the pipers and the myth of the return of Hephaestus to Olympus, suggesting that, apart from similar plots, the two stories share many motifs, such as references to themes derived from comedy and satyr drama. Searching for a possible channel of transmission of the story from Archaic Greece to Augustan Rome, the study explores the presence of satyric motifs in Etruscan vase-painting and Roman processional rites. It is furthermore emphasized that many of these motifs, which also appeared in lost satyr-plays, are echoed in Augustan poetry.

1. Introduction: Rome—A Historical Sketch

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-24
Author(s):  
Paul J. du Plessis
Keyword(s):  
Eighth Century ◽  
Archaic Period ◽  
Sixth Century ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Private Law ◽  
Roman Society ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Sketch

This chapter provides a historical sketch of Rome. It has been written to provide a contextual basis for the study of Roman private law. The history of Rome is traditionally divided into three main periods based on the dominant constitutional structure in Roman society during these three periods. These are the Monarchy (eighth century bc–510 bc), Republic (509–27 bc), and Empire (27 bc–ad 565). Scholars of Roman law tend to refine this division even further. Thus, to the scholar of Roman law, the period from the founding of Rome in the eighth century bc–c. 250 bc is regarded as the ‘archaic’ period of Roman law. The period thereafter, from c. 250 bc–27 bc, is generally described as the ‘pre-classical period’ of Roman law.For scholars of Roman law, the ‘classical’ period, c. first three centuries AD, and the Justinianic period, c. sixth century AD, are the most important, owing to the compilation of ‘classical’ Roman law by order the Byzantine Emperor, Justinian, in the sixth century.

Hesiod and the Visual Arts

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. A. Shapiro
Keyword(s):  
Visual Arts ◽  
Archaic Period ◽  
Test Case ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Vase Painting ◽  
Visual Artists ◽  
Text And Image ◽  
Major Work ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Relationship Of

This chapter explores the influence of Hesiod’s Theogony on Greek visual artists of the archaic period (ca. 700–480 bce). Since dozens of divinities and heroes mentioned in the poem appear in sculpture and (more often) vase painting and cannot be systematically treated, one major work with strong Hesiodic associations is examined as a test case. The Attic black-figure dinos signed by the painter Sophilos and dated ca. 580 bce includes more than thirty gods and goddesses participating in the wedding of Peleus and Thetis, future parents of Achilles. All of these can be found in the Theogony, and the poem can be a helpful guide to understanding how the individual figures are placed in the procession. The unique depiction of Okeanos on the dinos illustrates especially well the complex relationship of text and image.

IV Luxury Items

2010 ◽  
Vol 40 ◽  
pp. 75-94
Author(s):  
Brian A. Sparkes
Keyword(s):  
Intrinsic Value ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Total Output ◽  
Vase Painting ◽  
The Social ◽  
Gold Silver ◽  
Political Background ◽  
Greek Art ◽  
Material Evidence ◽  
Greek World

The uneven survival of material evidence from Greek antiquity has tended to guide interest and research towards the diferent forms and functions of sculpture (Chapters II and III) and of vase-painting (Chapters V and VI). They have been preserved in such numbers that, although we have only a fraction of the total output, we can study the ways in which they developed over the centuries against the social, economic, and political background and in the diferent parts of the Greek world. This has encouraged a tendency towards positivism and has had the unfortunate outcome of considering them as the exclusive elements of Greek art, with a concomitant emphasis on the aspects of restraint, simplicity, and so forth that were highlighted by the Neoclassical attitudes to Greek art that emerged in the eighteenth century. This approach has led scholars to demean the more lavish products that, by the very nature of their intrinsic value, have failed to survive in any numbers – gold, silver, ivory, and the like. Recent excavations, particularly those in cemeteries situated in the outlying areas of the Greek world and in the regions bordering on ancient Greece, have brought to light some of those expensive objects that are now missing from the Greek heartlands. Meanwhile, investigations into the more flamboyant aspects of Greek art have shown that buildings and architectural and freestanding sculpture were lavishly coloured. A nineteenth-century drawing by Donaldson shows coloured glass beads set into a column capital of the Erechtheion (Figure 21).

The Birth of Greek Art: From the Mycenaean to the Archaic Period

1982 ◽  
Vol 64 (3) ◽  
pp. 495
Author(s):  
A. M. Snodgrass ◽  
Roland Hampe ◽  
Erika Simon
Keyword(s):  
Archaic Period ◽  
Greek Art

The Specialist in Athenian Written Rhetoric During the Classical Period: A Reconsideration of Technical Rhetoric and Rhetorical Iconography

2021 ◽  
pp. 004728162110385
Author(s):  
Richard Leo Enos
Keyword(s):  
Technical Writing ◽  
Archaic Period ◽  
Artistic Expression ◽  
Classical Rhetoric ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Archaeological Evidence ◽  
Ancient Athens ◽  
Literate Practices ◽  
Craft Skills

This essay argues that technical rhetoric in ancient Athens is neither well nor fully understood in its present historical characterization but rather is best realized as occupying a position on a spectrum of literate skills ranging from an art to a craft. The dismissive views of technical writing advanced by Plato and Aristotle should be reconsidered and specialized literate practices be recognized as an important feature of rhetoric in Athens’ classical period. A review of discursive and material (archaeological) evidence reveals that technical writing was evolving into a craft-skill in Athens as early as the archaic period and, by the classical period, would be regarded as a respected “rhetorical” profession of artistic expression. This essay urges readers to reconsider the restrictive characterization of rhetoric advanced by some historians of rhetoric and include the specialist craft-skills of writing as a manifestation of technical rhetoric that both illustrates, and more accurately represents, the range of classical rhetoric in ancient Athens.

Menelaus in Archaic Art

2020 ◽  
pp. 204-257
Author(s):  
Anna R. Stelow
Keyword(s):  
Seventh Century ◽  
Sixth Century ◽  
Classical Period ◽  
Art Historians ◽  
Scant Attention ◽  
Annotated Catalogue ◽  
Greek Art

This chapter explores the depiction of Menelaus in archaic art. Menelaus appears in Greek art by the mid-seventh century BC and continues to be depicted by artists into the classical period and beyond. One may roughly divide images of Menelaus into two categories: ‘with Helen’ and ‘everything else’. Early on, ‘everything else’—depictions of Menelaus without Helen—is in fact more frequent, so far as one can tell from the few images that remain. By the mid-sixth century, however, Menelaus is depicted with Helen almost exclusively. Menelaus-Helen images have been studied by art historians and philologists from the standpoint of Helen. Scant attention has been given, however, to what the pictures ‘say’ about Menelaus. Even though certain iconographic details change somewhat over the course of the sixth century, there is a mostly stable and coherent depiction of Menelaus in black- and early red-figure Athenian vases that differs from his depiction in the classical period. The chapter then provides an annotated catalogue of the known images in which Menelaus appears without Helen.

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