DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.7897#0099
( 8i )
PLATES XXXIII & XXXIV.
T he subjects which we have hitherto seen represented on fictile vases, relate
either to mythology and the history of the heroic ages, or to religious and
civil ceremonies and customs. If any of the paintings which appear of a doubt-
ful character, were intended to represent historical personages or individuals
in private life, we have not the means of recognizing them.
The painting, Plate XXXIII (i), in which the names are affixed to the per-
sonages, has the singular merit of presenting the portraits of the illustrious
Lesbian bards, Alcaeus and Sappho, parents of lyric poetry.
Natives of the same city, contemporaries, riva^ in talent and celebrity, and
moreover, inflamed by a mutual passion, they are naturally associated in this
composition, where we see them according to the expressions of Horace (2).
iEoliis fidibus querentem
Sappho —
Et te sonantem plenius aureo
Alcsee, plectro.
But the painter seems to have had more particularly in view the lines of
Sappho herself, in which she relates her interview Avith Alcaeus, when, for the
first time, he declares his sentiments (3).
AIccbus. 0£>« Tt t' eiiriiv, aXk& f/,s xw^us'.
AiSws"
(1) The vase from which these paintings
are taken, is in the collection of M. Panet-
tieri, at Girgenti in Sicily, and was found in
the vicinity of that city.
It has been published with a very learned
and elaborate commentary by M. Steinbiichel,
director of the Imperial Collection of Anti-
quities at Vienna; but his interesting disserta-
tion being in the German language, and very
rare; the author wishing to communicate to
the English reader a monument of such im-
portance, has inserted in the present collec-
tion copies from the engravings of M. Stein-
biichel, fully confident of their accuracy.
The form of the vase is figured under Plate
xxxiu. Its height is rather more than two
feet, and its diameter in proportion. — The
figures reduced in the engravings, are thir-
teen inches high in the original.
(2) Lib. 11, Od. 13.
(3) Jlcceus. "I wish to speak, but bashful-
" ness prevents me".
PLATES XXXIII & XXXIV.
T he subjects which we have hitherto seen represented on fictile vases, relate
either to mythology and the history of the heroic ages, or to religious and
civil ceremonies and customs. If any of the paintings which appear of a doubt-
ful character, were intended to represent historical personages or individuals
in private life, we have not the means of recognizing them.
The painting, Plate XXXIII (i), in which the names are affixed to the per-
sonages, has the singular merit of presenting the portraits of the illustrious
Lesbian bards, Alcaeus and Sappho, parents of lyric poetry.
Natives of the same city, contemporaries, riva^ in talent and celebrity, and
moreover, inflamed by a mutual passion, they are naturally associated in this
composition, where we see them according to the expressions of Horace (2).
iEoliis fidibus querentem
Sappho —
Et te sonantem plenius aureo
Alcsee, plectro.
But the painter seems to have had more particularly in view the lines of
Sappho herself, in which she relates her interview Avith Alcaeus, when, for the
first time, he declares his sentiments (3).
AIccbus. 0£>« Tt t' eiiriiv, aXk& f/,s xw^us'.
AiSws"
(1) The vase from which these paintings
are taken, is in the collection of M. Panet-
tieri, at Girgenti in Sicily, and was found in
the vicinity of that city.
It has been published with a very learned
and elaborate commentary by M. Steinbiichel,
director of the Imperial Collection of Anti-
quities at Vienna; but his interesting disserta-
tion being in the German language, and very
rare; the author wishing to communicate to
the English reader a monument of such im-
portance, has inserted in the present collec-
tion copies from the engravings of M. Stein-
biichel, fully confident of their accuracy.
The form of the vase is figured under Plate
xxxiu. Its height is rather more than two
feet, and its diameter in proportion. — The
figures reduced in the engravings, are thir-
teen inches high in the original.
(2) Lib. 11, Od. 13.
(3) Jlcceus. "I wish to speak, but bashful-
" ness prevents me".