DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14547#0025
III.
The seventh century brings an essential change of style
all over Greece. Oriental influences, which had appeared oc-
casionally within the rigid structure of Late Geometric art,
now encroach upon it and finally eliminate it altogether. The
process varies in the different parts of Greece. In the Ionian
East as in Dorian Corinth or Argos, the venerable Geometric
style, having run its course for nearly half a millennium, yields
readily to the new manner. In Attica, the old tradition is still
strong enough to put up a violent fight, till the Orientalizing
Style finally triumphs. Attic vases from about 720 to 600
B. C. offer a disconcerting variety of attempts to resist, coor-
dinate or assimilate the foreign influences. The effect is often
inharmonious or even explosive and grotesque, but always in-
teresting and, at its best, endowed with a grandeur which no
other Greek style can rival. During the last decades of the
seventh century, the victory of Orientalizing ceramic art is
complete, and it provides us with the first monumental paint- Plate
ings in historical Greece. 12
This exciting development of what we call Early Attic
pottery was known quite imperfectly, up to a decade ago.
Since then, several cemeteries have yielded masses of such
pottery, among them many very large specimens which car-
ried on the tradition of placing great vases above the graves
as funeral monuments. The Kerameikos holds its rank here
in a twofold manner. Not only have fragments of some of
the finest Early Attic vases been discovered in our excavations,
but, what is more important, Kuebler's minute and painstak-
ing technique has unravelled the apparent confusion of graves
often dug across, or between, or through older ones, so that
all fundamental rules of stratification seemed to be reversed. Plates
Nothing has given us greater admiration and gratitude to- 13,14
wards Mr. Oberlaender than his enlightened comprehension
of the importance of such work. He would come to Athens
The seventh century brings an essential change of style
all over Greece. Oriental influences, which had appeared oc-
casionally within the rigid structure of Late Geometric art,
now encroach upon it and finally eliminate it altogether. The
process varies in the different parts of Greece. In the Ionian
East as in Dorian Corinth or Argos, the venerable Geometric
style, having run its course for nearly half a millennium, yields
readily to the new manner. In Attica, the old tradition is still
strong enough to put up a violent fight, till the Orientalizing
Style finally triumphs. Attic vases from about 720 to 600
B. C. offer a disconcerting variety of attempts to resist, coor-
dinate or assimilate the foreign influences. The effect is often
inharmonious or even explosive and grotesque, but always in-
teresting and, at its best, endowed with a grandeur which no
other Greek style can rival. During the last decades of the
seventh century, the victory of Orientalizing ceramic art is
complete, and it provides us with the first monumental paint- Plate
ings in historical Greece. 12
This exciting development of what we call Early Attic
pottery was known quite imperfectly, up to a decade ago.
Since then, several cemeteries have yielded masses of such
pottery, among them many very large specimens which car-
ried on the tradition of placing great vases above the graves
as funeral monuments. The Kerameikos holds its rank here
in a twofold manner. Not only have fragments of some of
the finest Early Attic vases been discovered in our excavations,
but, what is more important, Kuebler's minute and painstak-
ing technique has unravelled the apparent confusion of graves
often dug across, or between, or through older ones, so that
all fundamental rules of stratification seemed to be reversed. Plates
Nothing has given us greater admiration and gratitude to- 13,14
wards Mr. Oberlaender than his enlightened comprehension
of the importance of such work. He would come to Athens