DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.15099#0221
]74
to have been a votive tablet, placed probably in some sacred
enclosure in honour of a victory in a ehariot race, and probably
erected at the expense of the community to which the victor be-
longed. There are numerous evidences of the interest which the
tribe or city felt in the success of one of their members, and the
inscriptions which record the name of a victor almost invariably
state the name of his city and tribe.
This tablet was obtained by Lord Elgin from the court yard of
the English consul Logotheti's house at Athens.
Fig. 3. Height 2 f. 4 in. Width 1 f. 6 in. Old No. 238. New No. 278.
Upon this bas relief is represented a figure of Hygeia, seated
upon a four legged stool, upon which is placed a cushion ; her
feet rest upon a footstool. She is clothed in a long chiton with
short sleeves, and over it she wears a peplus, the lower part of
which is folded round her knees, while the upper part is thrown
over the back of her head in the form of a veil, but is quite open in
front, leaving both her arms free and disengaged. Upon her head
she wears a sort of modius, an emblem of wealth and power, and
occasionally of prosperity and health. In her left hand she holds
what has been called a fan or mirror, in the form of an ivy leaf,
and in her right a patera, out of which a serpent, which appears
to rest upon her shoulder, with its tail hanging down beneath the
seat, is preparing to feed. This is a mode of representing Hygeia
very frequently occurring upon coins and ancient monuments.
We have not met with any representations, such as we could
positively affirm to be either fans or mirrors, which bear the
forms of an ivy leaf, and are therefore more disposed to consider
the object held in the left hand of the figure as intended for the
actual leaf. Festus2 states that the ivy leaf was borne by Bacchus
and his followers, because its freshness and permanence was an
apt emblem of the perpetual youth of that deity. The same
2 De Verb. Sign. viii. 15. ed. Delph.
to have been a votive tablet, placed probably in some sacred
enclosure in honour of a victory in a ehariot race, and probably
erected at the expense of the community to which the victor be-
longed. There are numerous evidences of the interest which the
tribe or city felt in the success of one of their members, and the
inscriptions which record the name of a victor almost invariably
state the name of his city and tribe.
This tablet was obtained by Lord Elgin from the court yard of
the English consul Logotheti's house at Athens.
Fig. 3. Height 2 f. 4 in. Width 1 f. 6 in. Old No. 238. New No. 278.
Upon this bas relief is represented a figure of Hygeia, seated
upon a four legged stool, upon which is placed a cushion ; her
feet rest upon a footstool. She is clothed in a long chiton with
short sleeves, and over it she wears a peplus, the lower part of
which is folded round her knees, while the upper part is thrown
over the back of her head in the form of a veil, but is quite open in
front, leaving both her arms free and disengaged. Upon her head
she wears a sort of modius, an emblem of wealth and power, and
occasionally of prosperity and health. In her left hand she holds
what has been called a fan or mirror, in the form of an ivy leaf,
and in her right a patera, out of which a serpent, which appears
to rest upon her shoulder, with its tail hanging down beneath the
seat, is preparing to feed. This is a mode of representing Hygeia
very frequently occurring upon coins and ancient monuments.
We have not met with any representations, such as we could
positively affirm to be either fans or mirrors, which bear the
forms of an ivy leaf, and are therefore more disposed to consider
the object held in the left hand of the figure as intended for the
actual leaf. Festus2 states that the ivy leaf was borne by Bacchus
and his followers, because its freshness and permanence was an
apt emblem of the perpetual youth of that deity. The same
2 De Verb. Sign. viii. 15. ed. Delph.