Amazon statue types
The most celebrated of these artists, though born at different epochs, have joined in a trial of skill in the Amazons which they have respectively made. When these statues were dedicated in the Temple of Diana at Ephesus, it was agreed, in order to ascertain which was the best, that it should be left to the judgment of the artists themselves who were then present: upon which, it was evident that that was the best, which all the artists agreed in considering as the next best to his own. Accordingly, the first rank was assigned to Polycletus, the second to Phidias, the third to Cresilas, the fourth to Cydon, and the fifth to Phradmon.[3]
This anecdote encouraged the much-discussed identifications of four known types of Roman marble copies of the wounded Amazon with sculptors of lost originals that may be dated to 430 BC on stylistic grounds. These types, each well represented by numerous Roman copies and heads, are identified with three of Pliny's five sculptors; a type derived from Phradmon has not been identified. Of these, however, only the identification of the Mattei type as deriving from Phidias's original is undisputed. The assignment of the Sciarra-type as deriving from Polyclitus's original and Sosicles-type as deriving from Kresilas's original (or vice versa), on the other hand, is unestablished, although having been discussed since 1897. The German scholar R. Bolnach has written a thorough form-analysis for the Sciarra/Polycletus and Sosikles/Kresilas pairings.
Types
The usual designations of the statues, following Adolf Furtwängler, group them under the headings the Lansdowne type, the Capitoline type, the Mattei type and the single example known as the Villa Doria Pamphilj type.[7] A fifth type was excavated at the theater of Ephesus in 1898 but did not enter the discussion until the 1950s.
All five types show a standing female with a similar head and face, and (as with the
Amazon Mattei type
The prototype was discovered in 1770, as a marble Roman copy of a bronze original, and came into the
Amazon Sciarra type
1.94 m high, this copy dates to the era of Tiberius and is derived from Polyclitus's or Kresilas's original. It was found in Rome in 1868 in the Gardens of Sallust, and is now in the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Copenhagen,[12] The figure is resting her left arm on a column and her right hand behind her head, with her face leaning to one side. Her nose, right arm from the deltoid muscle downwards, the left forearm below the elbow, both hands, and the right foot and ankle have all been restored since discovery.
Amazon "Capitoline" or Sosicles type
This type is known principally from the 2.02 m high 2nd century AD marble copy (signed by Sosicles), deriving from Polyclitus's or Kresilas's original.[13] It was discovered in 1733, went into the collection of Cardinal Giuseppe Albani, and is now in the Capitoline Museums, Rome (Room 33). The figure has her left arm across her body below her breasts, and her right hand raised and open-palmed, as she looks down towards the wound in her right-hand side. She wears a baldric. The tip of nose, lower lip, left forearm, and hand with drapery have been restored since discovery.[3]
It was (before and after Sosicles's time) copied as a complete statue, as a
Lansdowne Amazon
A possible fourth is the Lansdowne Amazon, said to have been found in Tor Colombara by Gavin Hamilton, though it may be a variant on the Sciarra-type. Later at Lansdowne House, it is now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The right arm and lower legs have been restored.[14]
Villa Doria Pamphilj Amazon
Adolf Furtwängler attributed a much-restored Wounded Amazon at the
Ephesus Amazon
A fifth Amazon type was unearthed at the theatre of Ephesus in 1898 but languished unpublished.[17]
References
- Nat Hist. 34.75.
- ^ The designation of a "Kydon type" among surviving examples has been explained by a textual mistaking of Kresilas's place of birth - Kydonia - for the name of a fifth sculptor; Gisela Richter observed, however, that Kydon is not attested as an ethnic designation, but is well known as a given name (Richter, "Pliny's five Amazons", Archaeology 12 [1959:111-15]).
- ^ Pliny the Elder, The Natural History, John Bostock, M.D., F.R.S., H.T. Riley, Esq., B.A. Book XXXIV, Chapter XIX
- ^ "Pliny's account... may well be an embroidered anecdote prompted by the presence of four statues of the same subject in the same sanctuary by different artists" (von Bothmer, Amazons in Greek Art, Oxford 1957:212, quoted in , p. 2).
- ^ "quamquam diversis aetatibus geniti".
- ^ Brunilde Sismondo Ridgway, "A Story of Five Amazons", American Journal of Archaeology, 78.1 (January 1974:1-17).
- ^ Ridgway 1974:2ff
- ^ "Casts". Archived from the original on 2004-12-17. Retrieved 2007-02-19.
- ^ [1][permanent dead link]
- ^ "Amazon: Mattei Amazon -- Britannica Online Encyclopedia". Archived from the original on 3 December 2012.
- ^ "Statua di Amazzone ferita / Sala del Gladiatore / Museo Capitolino / Percorsi per sale - Musei Capitolini". Archived from the original on 2007-10-07. Retrieved 2007-02-19.
- ^ Accession number K176.
- ^ [2][permanent dead link]; Künstlerlexikon der Antike II (2004) 411 s.v. "Sosikles" (R. Vollkommer); Hans von Steuben: "Die Amazone des Polyklet", in: Polykletforschungen, ed. by Herbert Beck and Peter C. Bol, Berlin 1993, pp. 73-102
- ^ Marble Statue of a Wounded Amazon, Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- ^ Sestieri, "Alla ricerca di Phradmon", ''ArchCl 3 (1951:13-32) p. 16, noted by Ridgway 1974:3 and note 10.
- ^ The dog is part of the extensive restoration; the remains of a hand resting on the head, not an attribute of Artemis/Diana, were noted by Ridgway 1974:4
- ^ F. Eichler, "Eine neue Amazone und andere Skulpturen aus dem Theater von Ephesos," ÖJh 43 (1956/58:7-18); Gisela Richter, "Pliny's five Amazons", Archaeology 12 (1959:111-15).
External links
- The three Amazons
- Smith
- Ernest Gardner, "A Head in the Possession of Philip Nelson, Esq., M. B.," The Journal of Hellenic Studies, 18 (1898:141-146)
- James Grout, "The Amazons of Ephesus," part of the Encyclopædia Romana