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The Master of the Achilles Amphora in the Vatican
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 December 2013
Extract
The two vases reproduced on Pl. 13 and Pl. 14. 2 are the earliest redfigured lekythoi on which a grave-stele is represented. Shape and patterns and composition are the same in both; and if we compare the drawing of legs, arms, heads, and feet in the two vases, we shall find the closest resemblances. Now put the legs of the youth on a third lekythos (Fig. 2) beside the male legs on the two stele-vases: and the woman on Pl. 13 beside the standing women on a fourth lekythos, Pl. 14. 1, and a fifth, Fig. 3. Then let us turn to the Nolan amphora on p. 183, Fig. 4; surely the youth on A is strangely like the two youths and the man on our lekythoi: and now look at the figure on the reverse of the vase (Fig. 5(l)): have we not seen that himation before? and where if not in Pl. 14. 1 and Fig. 3? But no fewer than fifteen such himatia are collected in Fig. 5: each of the fifteen figures who wear them is the ‘mantle-figure’ drawn on the back of a vase. Would it not be interesting to know what the figures on the front of these vases were like?
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References
1 I wish to express my thanks to Mr. L. D. Caskey, Dr. F. C. Conybeare, Prof. J. De Mot, Mr. D. G. Hogarth, Dr. Köster, Dr. Orsi, Mr. E. Pottier, Dr. Sieveking, Mr. A. H. Smith, Dr. Staïs, Dr. Treu, ami Dr. Waldhauer, for their kindness in allowing me to publish vases in Boston, Brussels, Oxford, Berlin, Syracuse, Paris, Munich, London, Athens, Dresden and Petrograd. The drawings Pll. 15–16 are by Mr. F. Lambert; Pl. 14 by Mr. E. Gilliéron; Figs. 4 and 5l by Mr. Terzi; Figs. 15, and 5 m by Prof. Reichhold; Figs. 3, 14 and 23 by Mr. Rosario Carta.
2 Dr. Hauser kindly told me that the Achilles amphora and the Euphorbos vase will be reproduced on one plate in a future number of FRII.
3 By the word ‘amphora’ unqualified I mean the shape Furtw. Cat. Pl. 4, No. 35, either with such foot and handles as are there shown, or with the foot and handles described above.
4 E.g. both above and below, the Berlin amphora 2160 (J.H.S. 31, Pll. 15–16); below only FRH. Pll. 113 and 104.
5 Reinach, , Répertoire 2, p. 91Google Scholar, ‘il s'agit probablement d'une scène de départ, où l'inscription est une fantaisie du céramiste’.
6 B.M. E 258 (Gerhard, A.V. Pl. 187).
7 (1) Munich 2334: FR. Pll. 44–45: by Kleophiades (see J.H.S. 30, p. 43). (2) B.M. E 350: B.M. Cat. 3, Pll. 13 and 18, 1. (3) Brussels: Noël des Vergers, l'Étrurie, Pl. 32–36. (4) Munich 2345: FR. Pll. 94–95. (5) replica of the last, Berlin 2165: Gerhard, Etr. u. Kamp. Vb. Pll. 26–29. No. (1) is somewhat earlier than the rest, which all belong to the same few years: then comes a gap, and then our Paris vase.
8 I think the dot and circle eye is meant, if not always, at any late often, to indicate a light-coloured eye.
9 Furtwängler, , Berliner Winckelmannsprogramm 1890Google Scholar (= FRH. 3, p. 109; Buschor, , gr. Vasenmalerei, p. 188)Google Scholar: see the comments by Furtwängler, loc. cit. and Hauser (FRH. 3, pp. 108–109.)
10 We do not find the same feeling or the same composition either in the artless early groups of two persons moving in the same direction with their arms round each other's necks (e.g. Ionic amphora in Würzburg, J.H.S. 19, Pl. 5: Attic bf., amphora in Madrid, Leroux, Cat. Pl. 10: Attic rf., amphora by Phintias FR. Pl. 91, amphora by ‘the master of the Troilos hydria’ (J.H.S. 32, p. 171, Gerhard A. V. Pl. 126)): nor in the later Dionysiac groups (e.g. Mon. 10, Pl. 3): nor yet in the free style groups of small Sileu and drunken Dionysos or Hephaistos (pelike in Munich FR. Pl. 29: oiuochoai in Athens B.C.H. 1895, p. 98).
11 e.g. Deepdene, El. Cér. 1, Pl. 94: B.M.E 415: B.M. E 392: B.M. E 884, Munich 2362: Berlin 2354, A.Z. 1876, Pl. 11: Dresden, Kunstgewerbemuseum (A. Silen and Maenad.: B. youth).
12 On 10, the δ principle is not carried out. The best of these vases are Nos. 5 bis and 8: many of them are hasty and poor.
13 It is true that Alkaios has been read on a Nolan amphora with Zeus and Ganymede in the collection of Mr. Ricketts and Mr. Shannon (Cat. Burlington Club 1904, Pl. 92, p. 103;. But the inscription on that vase reads not but
: it is the work of an anonymous master belonging to the developed severe period, who for some reason frequently writes
on his vases: among his other works are the two cups B.M. E 75 and E 76 (Hartwig meist. Pll. 42, 2 and 43, and Pll. 41 and 42, 1): two neck-amphorae with ridged handles, B.M. E 319 and Boston inv. 01.8028: and the cup Louvre G 265.
14 A. 1. Diskobolos standing r., arms extended with diskos; 2. man standing right leg frontal, head l., 1. arm wrapped in himation, in r. hand upright wand (the prongs foreshortened). B. youth standing l., himation, r. arm extended holding strigil.
15 (1) Berlin 2252 (white-ground), A.Z. 1880, Pl. 11 and Riezler Pl. 1: Eros between palmettes. The rest red-figured. (2) Athens, Acropolis, fragment: lion and boar. (3) Bologna Palagi-Univ. 321, Pellegrini, Cat. Figs. 43–45: lion between palmettes. (4) Athens 1626, Collignon-Couve, Pl. 46, signed by Mys: two Nikai (and a third Nike on the neck). (5) Syracuse, mon. line. 17, Pl. 15, 2, by a follower of the Berlin master: Pegasos between palmettes. (6) Cab. Méd. 489, phot. Giraudon, by Hermonax: woman running between flowers: this is the only lekythos where the figure on the shoulder is related to the figure on the body; the woman is Zeus's love. (7) Syracuse 19880 (free style): Pegasos between palmettes. (8) A lekythos in Naples (Hcydemann 3184), which I have not seen; it is mentioned by Riezler, p. 89, note 1: Nike.
16 The following r.-f. lekythoi have picture on the shoulder only. (1) Munich 2475 (severe): lion. The rest free style. (2) B.M. inv. 1910. 4–30. 1: youth and woman with alabastron. (3) Syracuse: woman with phiale and youth with spears. (4) B.M. inv. 1909. 4–6. 1: Eros. (5) B.M. inv. 1909. 4–6. 2: woman.
17 The love-name Kleinias is found on five other vases (Klein liebl. pp. 163–164); four of these are dealt with on p. 195, Klein's No. 5 belongs to the same period but has no connexion with our master. If the Kleinias on the Oxford vase is, as seems likely, the same as the Kleinias on the Syracuse vase, he cannot be, as has been suggested, the father df the great Alkibiades; for the father of that Kleinias was an Alkibiades, not a Pedieus.
18 Am. J. A. 10, p. 411. McMahon divides them into three groups: (i) a group centring round and deriving from our No. 33: (ii) a group of three: (iii) a later group of five. I agree with his grouping in the main and would rearrange the vases in the following order and with some additions: (i) our four lekythoi 24, 25, 32, 33, by the Achilles master; our No. 33 a, school of the Achilles master, or by himself; our Nos. 33f, 33g, 33h, 33i, imitations of the Achilles master; Athens 1637, a later example, showing the influence of our master in the shape of the vase and the type of the palmettes, but hardly in the drawing. (ii) McMahon's second group: Athens 1636, 1298 and 1299, all by a single ungifted hand: (iii) three vases by a single hand: Athens 12804 and two in the Louvre (woman with tray and youth with spear at stele, perhaps identical with McMahon's ‘Orestes and Electra’ lekythos; and naked youth with diskos and youth in himation): (iv) two small lekythoi by a single hand, Berlin 2426 (Furtwängler, Samml. Sabouroff, text to pl. 15), and Berlin 2427. I have not seen thelekythos ‘in the Paris market’ mentioned by McMahon.
19 From Gela, bought in Palermo. Both faces have suffered: the end of the youth's nose is gone, and part of the woman's eye: the surface of the youth's chest is rubbed, so that the nipple may have been indicated, although no trace of it remains; small pieces of the woman's himation are missing, in the overfall and in the folds to the right of the left leg.
21 The youth carries a huge arrow, point downwards, as a staff: for such arrow-sticks compare the Schwerin Pistoxenos kotyle (Jahrbuch 27, Pl. 8), and the Glaukon oinochoe in the Thorvaldsen Museum at Copenhagen (Klein, Liebl. p. 155, No. 5).
22 A list of calyx-kraters with two rows is given by Hartwig, Roem. Mitt. 12. p. 102.
23 The key-pattern is confined to the reverse of the calyx-krater: I had overlooked these reverses when I wrote in J.H.S. 30, p. 47 that with the exception of the Corneto vase the key-pattern was not found on calyx-krateis.
24 It is found on the following calyx-kraters: Syracuse (A. Silen and Dionysos: B. Maenad), by the Berlin master (to be added to my list). Oxford 291 (school of the Berlin master). Girgenti, Mus. Civico, 10; Louvre, G 480.
25 Not from a lekythos, as stated in FRH. ibid.
26 I am inclined to place here the neck-amphora with twisted handles Mon. 3, Pl 23; but I have not seen the original, which was once in the Rhodes collection.
27 The youth on 24 has the two-line form, the youth on 14 has the lower line. only, and 11 has all three forms. The nostril of the second woman on 29 is destroyed.
28 This third line is common in the work of Kleophrades (e.g. J.H.S. 30, Pl. 5, No. 1).
29 The nose is occasionally somewhat aquiline, as in Achilles on 1, the flute-player on 3, or the Nike on 21; compare the practice of the Berlin-master (J.H.S. 31, p. 288, fin.).
30 In the developed severe style there are a few heads seen directly from behind: some of these are encased in helmets (v. J.H.S. 30, p. 64, note 86), the following are bare: cup from school of Brygos B.M. E 71 (A.Z. 1870, Pl. 39, where the head in question is wrongly restored); cups in the style of Onesimos, Mannheim (Hofmann, Vasen in Mannheim, pl. 2) and Vienna University; later, about 450, the same head is found on the new Nekyia kiater in New York (mentioned Bull. Metr. Mus.). On the Vienna cup, a first step is taken towards the three-quarter view from behind, for both ears are turned in the same direction. A contemporary rf. fragment in Würzburg (J.H.S. 27, pl. 3) already shows the same three-quarter position as on our vase: it appears again, some twenty years later, on the fragment of a large bell-krater with the Calydonian boar hunt (B.M. E 5093). The late free style sometimes inserts the eye; so on the Gigantomachy vases in Naples (FRH. 2, p. 196), Athens (Eph. Arch. 1883, Pl. 7), and the Louvre (FRH. Pl. 96), on the boar hunt volute krater in Naples (phot. Sommer 11053), and on a South Italian bell-krater in Lecce (158).
31 Schröder, B., Jahrbuch 27, pp. 317 ff.Google Scholar
32 Bosanquet, , J.H.S. 19, pp. 180–181.Google Scholar I have omitted Nos. J and T in Bosanquet's list, the latter because I have not seen the vase, which is much restored. Riezler, (Weissgründige Attische Lekythen, p. 110 and p. 21)Google Scholar, groups together our numbers 25, 29, 31, and 16: see also Fairbanks, Athenian White Lekythoi under each vase.
33 see Riezler, ibid. pp. 54 ff.
34 I mention the following details for comparison with the red-figured vases: legs, 25, 27, 31, 34, 37; arm, 4, 31; ankles, 2; feet; 4; hand extended downwards, 10, 18, 34 ; hand wrapt in himation, 6, 9, 13; himatia, 7, 9, 29. (The ‘frown-line’ on the forehead, seen on 4, 31, 34, 40, is also found on the sphinx in No. 12 of the red-figured list).
35 Many of the other lekythoi with Diphilos bear a strong resemblance to our group.
36 It is with some hesitation that I include this vase in my list.
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