Gardner, Percy: The principles of Greek art (London, 1924)

278

PRINCIPLES OF GREEK ART

CHAP.

is very similar, and Thracians again occupy the background;
but there are additions which make the interpretation clearer.
The nature of the ground, evidently a clearing in a forest, is
more clearly marked. Of the Thracians, one is standing up,
one has his head severed. A second figure of Diomedes appears,
who rushes on the reclining figures, bent on slaughter. All
these points have importance. The headless Thracian sug-
gests that the constrained attitudes of the rest are meant to
show that they have been slain, and are not merely asleep.

Fig. 96.

The standing Thracian has evidently been waked, and is giving
the alarm. Homer does not tell us that any of the Thracians
was awaked; but he comes near it, for he says that when
Diomedes came to King Rhesus he was breathing hard, for an
evil dream stood above his head. The second figure of Diom-
edes is very curious. This seems a distinct instance of that
method of continuous narration of which I have spoken above.
Diomedes is represented both in his ravening and in his retreat.