Chimera of Arezzo
Chimera of Arezzo | |
---|---|
Year | c. 400 BCE |
Type | Bronze |
Location | National Archaeological Museum, Florence |
The Chimera of Arezzo is regarded as the best example of ancient Etruscan art.[1] The British art historian David Ekserdjian described the sculpture as "one of the most arresting of all animal sculptures and the supreme masterpiece of Etruscan bronze-casting".[2] Made entirely of bronze and measuring 78.5 cm high with a length of 129 cm,[3] it was found alongside a small collection of other bronze statues in Arezzo, an ancient Etruscan and Roman city in Tuscany. The statue was originally part of a larger sculptural group representing a fight between a chimera and the Greek hero Bellerophon. This sculpture is likely to have been created as a votive offering to the Etruscan god Tinia and is held by the National Archaeological Museum, Florence.
History
According to Greek mythology, the Chimera or "She-Goat" was a monstrous, fire-breathing hybrid creature of Lycia in Anatolia created by the binding of multiple animal parts to create a singular unnatural creature. As the offspring of Typhon and Echidna, the Chimera ravaged the lands of Lycia at a disastrous pace.[4]
Distressed by the destruction of his lands, Iobates, the king of Lycia, ordered a young warrior named Bellerophon to slay her. This was also a favor to a neighboring king, Proetus, who wanted Bellerophon dead because his wife accused Bellerophon of rape and he assumed that the warrior would perish in the attempt to kill the beast.
Bellerophon set out on his winged horse, Pegasus, and emerged victorious from his battle, eventually winning not only the hand of Iobates' daughter but also his kingdom. It is this story that led art historians to believe that the Chimera of Arezzo was originally part of a group sculpture that included Bellerophon and Pegasus. Votive offerings for the gods often depicted mythological stories. A round hole on the left rump of the Chimera might suggest a spot where Bellerophon may have struck the beast with a now-missing spear.[2]
The first known literary reference was in Homer's
In response to questions of the statue's true meaning, Giorgio Vasari wrote in his Reasonings Over the Inventions He Painted in Florence in the Palace of Their Serene Highnesses:
Yes, sir, because there are the medals of the Duke my lord who came from Rome with a goat's head stuck in the neck of this lion, who as he sees VE, also has the serpent's belly, and we found the queue that was broken between those bronze fragments with many metal figurines that you've seen all, and the wounds that she has touched on show it, and yet the pain that is known in the readiness of the head of this animal ...[6]
The tail was not restored until 1785 when the Pistoiese sculptor Francesco Carradori (or his teacher, Innocenzo Spinazzi) fashioned a replacement, incorrectly positioning the serpent to bite the goat's horn. It is much more likely that the snake had to strike out against Bellerophon instead since biting the head of the goat meant it was biting itself.
Inscribed on its right foreleg is an inscription in the ancient Etruscan language. It has been variously deciphered, but most recently it is thought to read tinscvil "Offering belonging to Tinia".[7] The original statue is estimated to have been created around 400 BCE.
In 1718, the sculpture was transported to the
The sculpture was probably commissioned by an aristocratic clan or a prosperous community and erected in a religious sanctuary near the ancient Etruscan town of Arezzo, about 50 miles southeast of Florence.[8] The Chimera was one of a hoard of bronzes that had been carefully buried for safety sometime in classical antiquity. A bronze replica now stands near the spot of its original discovery.
The Etruscans
The Etruscan civilization was a wealthy civilization in ancient Italy with roots in the ancient region of Etruria, which existed during the early 8th–6th century BCE and extended over what is now a part of modern Tuscany, western Umbria, and northern Lazio.[9] The region became a part of the Roman Republic after the Roman–Etruscan Wars.
Heavily influenced by
The discovery
Discovered on November 15, 1553, by construction workers near the San Lorentino gate in Arezzo (ancient
Iconography
Typical
Methods and materials
In the 3rd millennium BCE ancient foundry workers discovered by trial and error that bronze had distinct advantages over pure copper for making artistic statuary. Bronze stays liquid longer when filling a mold due to its lower melting point. Bronze is a superior metal to copper for sculpture casting because of its higher tensile strength.[15] The island of Cyprus supplied most of the bronze used for artistic purposes throughout the ancient Mediterranean region.
The earliest forms of Greek bronze sculptures were simple, hand-worked sheets of bronze known as sphyrelaton (literally, "hammer-driven").
For smaller details, sculptors often made eyes out of glass and painted on body hair, clothing details, and skin color. Lost in antiquity, most historical knowledge of how certain bronze statues would have looked comes from studying surviving Roman marble copies.
Gallery
Exhibitions
- September 15, 2012 – December 9, 2012 at the Royal Academy of Arts "Bronze" [16]
July 16, 2009 – February 8, 2010 at the Getty Villa[17]
See also
- Capitoline Wolf, a bronze long thought to be of 4th-century BCE Etruscan origin, but possibly medieval.
References
- ^ Cartwright, Mark. “Chimera of Arezzo”. World History Encyclopedia, 13 Jan. 2017.
- ^ a b Dobrzynski, Judith H. “The Imaginary Made Nearly Real.” The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones & Company, 8 Feb. 2013, www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424127887323539804578264234269625580.
- ^ "The Chimaera of Arezzo" (PDF).
- ^ Hesiod, Theogony 319-25
- ^ "The Chimaera of Arezzo: July 16, 2009 – February 8, 2010". J. Paul Getty Museum. Retrieved 21 November 2017
- ^ Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli and Mario Torelli, The Art of Classical Antiquity, Etruria-Rome , Turin, Utet, 1976
- ^ TLE 663; Bonfante and Bonfante 2002, no. 26 p. 147
- ^ a b c d "The Chimaera of Arezzo: July 16, 2009 – February 8, 2010". J. Paul Getty Museum. "Discovery" Retrieved 21 November 2017
- ^ "The Etruscans, an introduction", Laurel Taylor, Khan Academy
- ^ a b Macanamara, Ellen. The Etrustcans, British Museum 1991. Print
- ^ "The Chimaera of Arezzo (Getty Villa Exhibitions)". www.getty.edu. Retrieved 2018-03-06.
- ^ Cellini, Benvenuto, and John Addington Symonds. 1955. The autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini. N.Y.: Modern Library.
- ^ a b "The Chimaera of Arezzo (Getty Villa Exhibitions)". www.getty.edu. Retrieved 2017-12-27.
- ^ a b c d e Becker, Jeffery A. “Chimera of Arezzo (Article) | Etruscan.” Khan Academy, www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ancient-art-civilizations/etruscan/a/chimera-of-arezzo
- ^ a b c Hemingway, Authors: Seán Hemingway Colette. “The Technique of Bronze Statuary in Ancient Greece | Essay | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art.” The Met's Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/grbr/hd_grbr.htm.
- ^ "Bronze | Exhibition | Royal Academy of Arts". www.royalacademy.org.uk. Retrieved 2017-12-27.
- ^ "The Chimaera of Arezzo (Getty Villa Exhibitions)". www.getty.edu. Retrieved 2017-12-27.