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Lot Essay
PUBLISHED:
J. D. Beazley, Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, II, 2nd ed., Oxford, 1963, p. 1593, no. 37 bis.
Cf. M. Bieber, The History of the Greek and Roman Theater, Princeton, 1971, p. 16, fig. 50 for a similar subject on a black-figure lekythos in Berlin. Bieber comments "Like all mystery religions the Dionysiac mysteries promised purification, teaching, and the vision of godhead ... The vision of the godhead was attained not through the guidance of any official hierarchy but through direct union with the divine. The mortal men and women became members of the holy thiasus of Dionysus, animals of his holy herd (thiasus), a goat...: 'I fell, a small goat, into the milk; I, who was a man, became a god'; 'Happy and blessed one, thou shalt be a god instead of a mortal' - so the Orphic-Dionysiac tablets of gold found in South Italy are inscribed. Perhaps such a goat, who had been a man, is represented on the black-figured lekythos of the early fifth century in Berlin. A goat with a human face is surrounded by sileni. One holds his horn, while the other seated on a rock is holding a writing tablet and a stylus."
J. D. Beazley, Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, II, 2nd ed., Oxford, 1963, p. 1593, no. 37 bis.
Cf. M. Bieber, The History of the Greek and Roman Theater, Princeton, 1971, p. 16, fig. 50 for a similar subject on a black-figure lekythos in Berlin. Bieber comments "Like all mystery religions the Dionysiac mysteries promised purification, teaching, and the vision of godhead ... The vision of the godhead was attained not through the guidance of any official hierarchy but through direct union with the divine. The mortal men and women became members of the holy thiasus of Dionysus, animals of his holy herd (thiasus), a goat...: 'I fell, a small goat, into the milk; I, who was a man, became a god'; 'Happy and blessed one, thou shalt be a god instead of a mortal' - so the Orphic-Dionysiac tablets of gold found in South Italy are inscribed. Perhaps such a goat, who had been a man, is represented on the black-figured lekythos of the early fifth century in Berlin. A goat with a human face is surrounded by sileni. One holds his horn, while the other seated on a rock is holding a writing tablet and a stylus."