DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5253#0297
264 ARCHAIC SCULPTURE.
thing so portrait-like, that he may suggest the Garibaldi type. The other,
on Pelops' side, raises himself as if in pleasant excitement, but is, unfortu-
nately, sadly injured. Are these two bearded figures, so different in expression,
only hostlers, as Pausanias says ? or are they the seers, who, according to poetry
and legend, looked into the future, and saw its course, but were unable to
change it ? On old vases where going to battle is pictured, and especially
in the portentous preparation for Amphiaraos' departure, such a seer sits on
the ground, with head in his hand, in attitude of sorrow.4fi6 So here the brood-
ing old man on Oinomaos' side doubtless is meant to foresee with anxiety the
doom of his master, but the one on Pelops' side the victory of his party.
On the lips of the brooding old seer the magnifying-glass detected traces of red
color ; and there can be no doubt, that, throughout these pedimental figures, very
many details, as we have seen was the case with the metopes, were carried out
in color, the fading of which, as in the case of Heracles, has left a look of
baldness.
Behind the pensive seer we see a crouching lad, apparently in conversation
with the stretched-out form of the river-god Cladeos in the corner of the pedi-
ment. This god is represented as bearded but youthful, because the river which
he personified was the smaller of the two at Olympia. Who this boy with hand
resting on his foot may be, we know not. Perhaps he is a young groom, but
more probably a local river-god imagined as conversing with Cladeos concern-
ing the coming scene, and thus locating it more definitely. In both these
figures old conventionalism seems to have yielded to a direct study of nature,
perhaps of the model, evident in Cladeos' muscular chest, broad shoulders, and
somewhat ordinary pose. In the drapery, also, the conventional lines are gone ;
and sometimes the folds have even an arranged look : thus, in the river-god's
drapery, a fold on his back is laid as though intentionally to break a monoto-
nous line. But the artistic thought stops here: this striving to imitate nature
is not coupled with any abstraction from it which would make the folds fall in
lines of beauty while following their inherent laws. The same realism strug-
gling to approach nature, and still far from idealized form, appears in the boy
handling his foot. Corresponding to this lad, at the opposite end is a female
figure, entirely unnoticed by Pausanias, — probably a local nymph, who, bent
over, seems in conversation with the bearded Alpheios reclining in the corner
of the pediment, and supporting his head on his hand. His form, no less than
the Cladeos, shows the study of nature, but as yet full of the slag of crude
materialism, and far from the idealized forms of later works, such as the river-
gods of the Parthenon.
Everywhere throughout this pedimental sculpture the drapery is far inferior
to the nude; while in the forms of the gods and mythic heroes the nude is less
fleshly than in those of seers, hostlers, and river-gods. The drapery of the
Hippodameia is very like that of the Athena in the eleventh metope (Fig. 124),
thing so portrait-like, that he may suggest the Garibaldi type. The other,
on Pelops' side, raises himself as if in pleasant excitement, but is, unfortu-
nately, sadly injured. Are these two bearded figures, so different in expression,
only hostlers, as Pausanias says ? or are they the seers, who, according to poetry
and legend, looked into the future, and saw its course, but were unable to
change it ? On old vases where going to battle is pictured, and especially
in the portentous preparation for Amphiaraos' departure, such a seer sits on
the ground, with head in his hand, in attitude of sorrow.4fi6 So here the brood-
ing old man on Oinomaos' side doubtless is meant to foresee with anxiety the
doom of his master, but the one on Pelops' side the victory of his party.
On the lips of the brooding old seer the magnifying-glass detected traces of red
color ; and there can be no doubt, that, throughout these pedimental figures, very
many details, as we have seen was the case with the metopes, were carried out
in color, the fading of which, as in the case of Heracles, has left a look of
baldness.
Behind the pensive seer we see a crouching lad, apparently in conversation
with the stretched-out form of the river-god Cladeos in the corner of the pedi-
ment. This god is represented as bearded but youthful, because the river which
he personified was the smaller of the two at Olympia. Who this boy with hand
resting on his foot may be, we know not. Perhaps he is a young groom, but
more probably a local river-god imagined as conversing with Cladeos concern-
ing the coming scene, and thus locating it more definitely. In both these
figures old conventionalism seems to have yielded to a direct study of nature,
perhaps of the model, evident in Cladeos' muscular chest, broad shoulders, and
somewhat ordinary pose. In the drapery, also, the conventional lines are gone ;
and sometimes the folds have even an arranged look : thus, in the river-god's
drapery, a fold on his back is laid as though intentionally to break a monoto-
nous line. But the artistic thought stops here: this striving to imitate nature
is not coupled with any abstraction from it which would make the folds fall in
lines of beauty while following their inherent laws. The same realism strug-
gling to approach nature, and still far from idealized form, appears in the boy
handling his foot. Corresponding to this lad, at the opposite end is a female
figure, entirely unnoticed by Pausanias, — probably a local nymph, who, bent
over, seems in conversation with the bearded Alpheios reclining in the corner
of the pediment, and supporting his head on his hand. His form, no less than
the Cladeos, shows the study of nature, but as yet full of the slag of crude
materialism, and far from the idealized forms of later works, such as the river-
gods of the Parthenon.
Everywhere throughout this pedimental sculpture the drapery is far inferior
to the nude; while in the forms of the gods and mythic heroes the nude is less
fleshly than in those of seers, hostlers, and river-gods. The drapery of the
Hippodameia is very like that of the Athena in the eleventh metope (Fig. 124),