AN ATTIC BLACK-FIGURED PANATHENAIC AMPHORA

NEAR THE KLEOPHRADES PAINTER, CIRCA 490 B.C.

细节

AN ATTIC BLACK-FIGURED PANATHENAIC AMPHORA
NEAR THE KLEOPHRADES PAINTER, CIRCA 490 B.C.
The obverse with the characteristic image of Athena, the goddess of war striding forth between Doric columns, each surmounted by a cock, wearing a high-crested helmet and her snake-fringed aegis over a chiton patterned with red dots, carrying a spear and shield with the winged horse Pegasos as the blazon, framed by a band of dots, an inscription to the left, partially lost, reading TON ATHENETHEN ATHLON "from the games at Athens;" the reverse with two pentathletes and a trainer standing between them, the bearded trainer facing right but looking back, a himation draped over his left shoulder and enveloping his body, a fillet in added red in his short hair, holding a staff horizontally across his body, a discus-thrower to the left, facing right, depicted nude, holding his discus in his left hand, his right held out before him with the forefinger raised, a pick on the ground before him, and a jumper to the right, walking to the right but looking back, depicted nude, holding weights in each hand; with rays above the foot, alternating red and black tongues on the shoulders, and lotus-palmette chain on the neck, details in added red and white
25 5/8 in. (65.1 cm.) high

来源

with Feuardent Brothers, Paris, 1930s.
with Jean Mikas, Paris, 1950s.
European Private Collection.

出版

K. Peters, Studien zu den panathenäischen Preisamphoren, Berlin, 1936, no. 4, pl. 8.
A. Smets, "Groupes chronologiques des amphores panathénaïques inscrites," L'Antiquité classique 5, 1936, no. 47.
J.D. Beazley, Attic Black-Figure Vase-Painters, New York, 1978, no. 405/1.
M. Bentz, Panathenäische Preisamphoren, Basel, 1998, no. 5.021.

拍品专文

The most important festival celebrated in ancient Athens was the Panathenaia, the state festival honoring the city's patron deity, Athena Polias. Every fourth year was the Great Panathenaic festival, which included musical and athletic competitions. The victors were awarded huge prize amphorae containing one metrates (over ten gallons) of oil from the goddess's sacred grove. The obverse of these pottery jars always depicts the goddess between columns, usually surmounted by cocks, and accompanied by the inscription TON ATHENETHEN ATHLON, "from the games at Athens." The reverse depicts the event for which the vase served as the prize. On the present vase the reverse shows two competitors from the pentathalon, which was a five-part contest consisting of footrace, discus, long or broad jump, javelin, and wrestling. Aristotle praised pentathletes for their all-around beauty, but other authors suggest that the event attracted second-class athletes (see Neils, "Panathenaic Amphoras: Their Meaning, Makers and Markets," p. 29 and Kyle, "The Panathenaic Games: Sacred and Civic Athletes," p. 85 in Neils, ed., Goddess and Polis, The Panathenaic Festival in Ancient Athens).

Boardman (Athenian Black Figure Vases, pp. 167-168) informs that the canonical shape and decoration for Panathenaic prize amphorae was established by about 530 B.C. and that the use of black figure was retained for them long after the technique was abandoned for ordinary pottery. Around 500 B.C. and after, these state commissions attracted the most distinguished red figure painters, including the Kleophrades Painter and his associates. Beazley considered the painter of the present vase as "very close" to the Kleophrades Painter (op. cit., p. 405).