Chapter XVII
.). This cup is interesting for the introduction of a new type, that of the young dancing girl.[1360] The beautiful cup on Plate XXXIX. (fig. 2) has also been referred to him. Among other interesting subjects are the Triptolemos cup in Frankfurt, the cup with the Judgment of Paris (which may be compared with that of Hieron), and the Sack of Troy cup in the Louvre (Plate LIV.). This latter subject we have already seen treated as a whole by Euphronios, though previously it had only appeared in the form of isolated episodes; but the growing tendency to pictorial treatment of such subjects is well illustrated by the cup of Brygos and the later Vivenzio hydria in Naples.
=Peithinos= is a master who has been largely rediscovered by Hartwig. Only one cup with his signature is known, a fine example in Berlin (2279) with the Euphronian καλός-name Athenodotos, and the interior subject of Peleus seizing Thetis, treated with great decorative effect. Hartwig traces his style in eight more cups, chiefly with erotic and banqueting subjects, and points out among the former an early instance of sentimentality in vase-painting in the figure of a love-sick man. He characterises his style as “over-ripe archaism,” with a slight reversion to the mannerisms of Exekias, and great attention to detail in general. He sees in Peithinos the first instance of the pictorial tendency of which we have spoken, contrasting him with Euphronios and other painters who were always in the first instance draughtsmen.
In the Berlin Museum there is a magnificent cup (2278)[1361] purporting to be made by _Sosias_, a name which does not otherwise occur.[1362] In the absence of indications of the painter, Hartwig and Furtwaengler are inclined to think that the decoration may be the work of Peithinos; but this can hardly amount to more than a matter of individual opinion. It is one of the most sumptuously decorated cups of this period that we possess, but the exterior is unfortunately greatly damaged. In the interior Achilles is represented binding up the wounded arm of his comrade Patroklos. The expressions of the figures and the remarkable foreshortening of Patroklos’ right leg are indications of the admirable skill of the painter, whoever he may have been. On the exterior is an assemblage of gods and goddesses to receive Herakles on his entry into Olympos, including seventeen figures in all, distinguished by inscriptions.
In the later chapters of his great work Hartwig has disentangled the styles of several masters of this period, though not in every case is he able to give their names; but some vases can be grouped together by means of καλός-names or by special peculiarities, such as the use of a conventional foliage-ornament. They are, however, for the most part of inferior merit to those of the painters hitherto discussed. Among the painters’ names are those of Amasis II., Apollodoros, and Onesimos; the latter has already been mentioned in connection with Euphronios.
Generally speaking, the chief characteristic of the cups of this period is the tendency to treat the interior and exterior as representing successive episodes of one theme,[1363] as in the Troilos cup of Euphronios, or at least as having some connection, more or less definite, as in the Theseus cup of the same master.
Both in exterior and interior designs the development of composition is very strongly marked, and there is a notable tendency to enhance the effect of interior scenes by rich decorative borders. Even in the work of individual painters a great development is to be observed, showing how rapid the growth of artistic power was at this time; and thus we are able to distinguish in Euphronios and Duris an earlier and a later manner. As Hartwig has said (p. 95), the period of progress associated with the names of Euphronios and Brygos is characterised by an individuality and freedom which were partly the cause and partly the effect of a closer study of nature and an increased capacity for rendering it.
Among other artists of the time, almost the only conspicuous name is that of _Smikros_, the painter of two stamni, in the British Museum (E 438) and Brussels,[1364] and also most probably of a “Nolan” amphora in the Louvre (G 107), which is inscribed [ΔΟΚΕΙ ΣΜΙΚΡΩΙ ΕΙΝΑΙ], “This is evidently Smikros’ work.” He signs in both the former cases with ἔγραψεν. He appears, says M. Gaspar, as a rival of Euphronios and Duris, but fails in the attempt to equal their achievements in vividness, originality, and faithful reproduction of the human figure. The Brussels stamnos is interesting as representing inscribed persons from ordinary life, just as Phintias (see p. 429) introduces on a vase figures of the artists Tlenpolemos and Euthymides. Klein also attributes to him a krater at Arezzo[1365] with the καλός-name Pheidiades, which occurs on the signed vases. It is remarkable for the treatment of the subject (Herakles and the Amazons) in the style of the B.F. vases.
The next development of R.F. vase-painting, which presents all the characteristics of the best period of Greek art and of the highest point to which that art attained, is that called the =fine style=. In this the influence of painting first really begins to manifest itself, especially that of the Polygnotan school, which covers the years 470–440 B.C. It is shown alike in composition and in drawing, and to a lesser degree in the colouring; but the general use of colours and gilding on vases really belongs to the succeeding stage. As regards the drawing, the figures have lost the hardness which at first characterised them; the eyes are no longer represented obliquely, but in profile; the extremities are finished with greater care, the chin and nose are more rounded, and have lost the extreme elongation of the earlier schools. The limbs are fuller and thicker, the faces noble, the hair of the head and beard treated with greater breadth and mass, just as subsequently the painter Zeuxis gave more flesh to his figures in order to make them appear of greater breadth and grandeur, like Homer, who represented even his women of larger proportions.[1366]
The great charm of these designs is the beauty of the composition, and the more perfect proportion of the figures. The head is an oval, three-quarters of which forms the distance from the chin to the ear; the disproportionate length of limbs has entirely disappeared, and the countenance assumes a natural form and expression. The folds of the drapery, too, are freer, and the attitudes have lost their old rigidity. It is the outgrowth of the life and freedom of an ideal proportion, united with careful composition. Before the introduction of the Polygnotan style of composition, the figures are generally large, and arranged in groups of two or three on each side, occupying about two-thirds of the height of the vase; but the pictorial influence is more in the direction of smaller figures, grouped at different levels. Figures in full face are now much less uncommon. In some of the larger vases with figures on both sides, such as the kraters, the reverse side is not finished with the same care as the obverse, being intended to stand against a wall, or at least to be less prominently seen.
The career of Polygnotos extends from 478 B.C. to 447 B.C., as far as can be gathered from the various works on which we know him to have been engaged. In 478 he painted frescoes for the temple of Athena Areia at Plataea, in 474 he decorated the Theseion and Anakeion at Athens, in 460 he worked with Mikon on the Stoa Poikile, and from 458 to 447 he was engaged on his great paintings of the Ἰλίου Πέρσις and Νέκυια for the Lesche at Delphi.[1367] As all these paintings are described more or less in detail by Pausanias, their subjects form a valuable clue to the investigation of his influence on the vases.
[Illustration:
FIG. 103. KRATER OF POLYGNOTAN STYLE IN LOUVRE: THE SLAYING OF THE NIOBIDS. ]
At first, indeed, this is limited to single figures or motives[1368]; it is not until about 470 that his method of composition, with its rough perspective and variety of level, finds its way on to the vases. The oldest vase on which these new features appear is the krater from Orvieto in the Louvre,[1369] which has usually been placed about 470, though at first sight it appears to be later; but certain small details of an archaic character point the other way. The main subject is a group of Argonauts, which has been variously interpreted, but Robert suggests that the scene represents their preparations for departure, and is thus able to associate it with a painting by Mikon in the Anakeion, on which that subject was employed. The various vases which depict the story of Theseus’ visit to Amphitrite[1370] are referred also by Robert to an original by Mikon in the Theseion (about 470 B.C.). The cup of Euphronios (p. 431) and the Girgenti krater represent a stage of the subject contemporary with that painter; on the Bologna krater we have a reduced version of his work; and on the Tricase vase from Ruvo, which belongs to the school of Hermonax (see below) a simpler form of the myth occurs, contemporary with the preceding.
The technique and colouring of Polygnotos’ works find their reflection principally in the polychrome vases (see below, p. 455). On the red-figured vases of this period we must look for his influence rather in the arrangement and poses of the figures, the methods of indicating locality, and the attempts at perspective. Professor Robert’s ingenious reproductions of his paintings[1371] may be profitably compared with such vases as the Orvieto krater, the Blacas krater in the British Museum (E 466 = Plate LIII.), or the somewhat later hydria of Meidias (see below). The principle adopted was that of arranging the figures, not in even rows or in proper perspective, but at different levels, those in the background being sometimes half hidden by rising ground. It is a principle which we shall find even more fully developed in the South Italy vases of the succeeding century; but it was at the time of its appearance quite sudden and unexpected, contradicting at first sight the decorative principles of vase-painting. Polygnotos was also fond of indicating characteristics of his personages or allusions to their history by means of subtle touches or actions. Thus Phaedra was represented in a swing, Eriphyle with her hand on her neck (with reference to the necklace), Theseus and Peirithoos in sitting postures, and so on. This is quite in the manner of the fifth-century vase-painter. Finally, the late F. Dümmler has pointed out that his influence is possibly to be traced in another manner on certain vases, viz. in the use of the dialect of Paros and Thasos for the inscriptions instead of Attic forms.[1372] It should be borne in mind that he was a native of Thasos, and would naturally have used his native dialect for the inscriptions over his figures.
The following is a list of vases showing Polygnotan influence:
(1) In types and motives only (470–460 B.C.)[1373]:
B.M. E 170, 450, 469; Berlin 2403 = Reinach, i. 450; Naples 2421 = Reinach, ii. 278 and 3089 = Millingen- Reinach, 33; Reinach, i. 184 (two vases), 218, 221; _Jahrbuch_, 1886, pl. 10, fig. 2; Millingen-Reinach, 49–50; Furtwaengler, _50^{tes} Winckelmannsfestprogr._ pl. 2[1374]; Louvre A 256 = _Jahrbuch_, 1887, pl. 11 (Dümmler).
(2) In method of composition (460–440 B.C.)[1375]:
B.M. E 224, E 466, E 492; Berlin 2588 = Reinach, i. 217 and 2471 = _Coll. Sabouroff_, i. 55; Naples R.C. 239 = Reinach, i. 482; Jatta 1093, 1095, 1498 = Reinach, i. 175, 119, 111; Petersburg 1792, 1807 = Reinach, i. 1, 7; Reinach, i. 522, 5 (in Bologna); _Ant. Denkm._ i. 36 (_ibid._); Reinach, i. 191; and reflecting the style of Polygnotos or of Mikon: Reinach, i. 226–27 = _J.H.S._ x. p. 118 (Louvre); Reinach, i. 232 = _J.H.S._ xviii. p. 277.
To these may perhaps be added:
Naples 2889 = Raoul-Rochette, _Mon. Inéd._ pls. 13–4; Athens 1921 = Reinach, i. 511; Berlin 2326 (see _Jahrbuch_, 1887, p. 172).
In this stage, as has been noted, artists’ signatures are far more rare than in either of the two preceding, and cup-painters in particular are few and far between. The καλός-names, too, have almost entirely come to an end. Of the cup-painters the only known names are those of Aeson, Erginos and Aristophanes, Hegias, Hegesiboulos, Sotades, and Xenotimos, and of these four (Aeson, Hegesiboulos, Hegias,[1376] and Xenotimos[1377]) are only represented by single specimens. Two very fine cups, made by _Erginos_ and painted by _Aristophanes_, are in the museums of Berlin and Boston respectively,—the former decorated with scenes from the Gigantomachia within and without (Fig. 112); the latter has in the interior Herakles rescuing Deianeira from Nessos, on the exterior a battle of Centaurs and Lapiths. An unsigned duplicate of this vase was acquired by the Boston Museum at the same time.[1378] The vase by _Aeson_ is decorated with scenes from the labours of Theseus.[1379]
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PLATE XL
[Illustration:
CUPS BY SOTADES. 1, IN BOSTON; 2, BRIT. MUS.: POLYEIDOS IN THE TOMB OF GLAUKOS. ]
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_Sotades_ stands apart from his contemporaries as an artist of much individuality, with a tendency to great refinement and delicacy in his work. He has left one R.F. kantharos and some half-dozen vases of the white-ground type, two with very interesting subjects (see also p. 457); all but the first were formerly in M. van Branteghem’s collection, and these are now divided between the British and Boston Museums. He is remarkable for his extremely delicate cups, with handles in the form of a chicken’s merrythought, and he also made two phialae with white interior and moulded exterior painted in rings of red, white, and black; on the interior of one of these a cicala (τέττιξ) is ingeniously modelled so as to appear resting there (Plate XL.). _Hegesiboulos_, one of whose vases was also in the Van Branteghem collection,[1380] seems to have been an artist of similar tendencies.
Of the rest, _Epigenes'_ name appears on a small kantharos in the Bibliothèque Nationale, and those of _Megakles_ and _Maurion_ on pyxides. Among the painters who exercised their skill on larger vases the most noteworthy is _Polygnotos_, who has left an amphora and two stamni. The similarity of his name to that of the great contemporary painter has naturally led to conjectures as to a possible connection of the two, which has been discussed by Professor Robert in publishing two of the vases with his signature.[1381] His conclusion is that they belong to the period 460–450 B.C., in which the influence of the painter is beginning to make itself felt, but only in isolated figures and motives, not, as in a class of which we shall presently speak, in the composition of scenes. The earliest of the three is the stamnos in Brussels, with the subject of Kaineus overwhelmed by the Centaurs[1382]; next comes the stamnos with the combat of Herakles and the Centaur Dexamenos[1383]; and lastly the British Museum amphora,[1384] which retains an archaic form, but in its style and drawing presents no traces of archaism.[1385] In the reverses of his vases, with their tendency to meaningless and carelessly drawn figures, we seem to trace the beginnings of the decadence. _Hermonax_, who painted four stamni and a “pelike,” seems to be closely associated in style with Polygnotos.[1386] Professor Robert would also attribute to a pupil of Polygnotos three fine R.F. cups of about 445 B.C.—the Kodros cup in Bologna (