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拍品专文
An inscription along the architrave (MHΔEIA) identifies this woman as Medeia. With her distinctive clothing, including a shoulder-pinned back mantle, belted peplos and sleeved chiton, Medea can be recognized as a parthenos (maiden), a term used to define an unmarried young woman. As K. Margariti remarks (op. cit., 2018, p. 93), “Because marriage marked the successful passage of a woman into womanhood, parthenoi occupied a transitional period between childhood and adult life. A parthenos is neither a child nor a woman. She is on the threshold of becoming an adult, a wife, and a mother.” As demonstrated here, the maiden was viewed in Classical Athenian society as important enough to warrant her own dedicated funerary monument. L. Jones Roccos (op. cit., p. 262) surmises that the untimely death of a parthenos represented “a loss not only to their families but to the entire [Athenian] culture,” as it precluded the eventuality of future offspring.
Stelae depicting parthenoi are comparatively rare, representing only 4% of C.W. Clairmont’s extensive corpus of Attic funerary reliefs (see Clairmont, op. cit. and Margariti, op. cit., 2018, p. 105). The present relief is especially well-detailed and preserves four antefixes surmounting the architectural fame, circular brooches that pin her back mantle in place and buttons along the sleeves of her chiton, creating a star-like pattern with the cloth. Clairmont (op. cit.) notes that Medeia probably held an object in her raised right hand, painted rather than sculpted. For a more complete relief depicting a parthenos, see the example of Eukoline, now in the Kerameikos Archaeological Museum, no. 1.281 in Clairmont, op. cit.
This relief is recorded in the Brummer Gallery Archives preserved at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The inventory card (no. P801) specifies that the stele was purchased from the Athenian dealer Theodoros A. Zoumpoulakis and was delivered to the Paris gallery in November 1923. The card is stamped “3rd Auction,” erroneously indicating that the relief was sold at Parke-Bernet Galleries in 1949 (Part III of the Notable Art Collection Belonging to the Estate of the Late Joseph Brummer); however, it remained in the Brummer family until 1979 when it was dispersed at auction in Zurich.
Stelae depicting parthenoi are comparatively rare, representing only 4% of C.W. Clairmont’s extensive corpus of Attic funerary reliefs (see Clairmont, op. cit. and Margariti, op. cit., 2018, p. 105). The present relief is especially well-detailed and preserves four antefixes surmounting the architectural fame, circular brooches that pin her back mantle in place and buttons along the sleeves of her chiton, creating a star-like pattern with the cloth. Clairmont (op. cit.) notes that Medeia probably held an object in her raised right hand, painted rather than sculpted. For a more complete relief depicting a parthenos, see the example of Eukoline, now in the Kerameikos Archaeological Museum, no. 1.281 in Clairmont, op. cit.
This relief is recorded in the Brummer Gallery Archives preserved at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The inventory card (no. P801) specifies that the stele was purchased from the Athenian dealer Theodoros A. Zoumpoulakis and was delivered to the Paris gallery in November 1923. The card is stamped “3rd Auction,” erroneously indicating that the relief was sold at Parke-Bernet Galleries in 1949 (Part III of the Notable Art Collection Belonging to the Estate of the Late Joseph Brummer); however, it remained in the Brummer family until 1979 when it was dispersed at auction in Zurich.