DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5253#0431
CHAPTER XXII.
SCULPTURE OUTSIDE OF ATTICA DURING THE SECOND HALF OF THE FIFTH
CENTURY (concluded).
Artists of this Period. — Phigaleia Sculptures. — Apollo Epicurios. — Metopes.— Frieze. — Its Subjects.
Passionateness in Treatment. — Contrast to Attic Friezes. — Affinities in Style. — Sculpture in
other Parts of Peloponnesos. — Paionios of Mende. — His Nike. — Its Discovery. — Its Recent
Restoration. — Description of the Nike. — Its Boldness, etc. — Comparison with other Works. —
Affinities with Nereid Monument. — Art on the Islands. — Delian Sculptures. — Comparison
drawn between them and Paionios' Nike. — Explanation of Resemblances and Differences. —
Colotes. — Lykia. — Sculptures from Xanthos. — Tomb. — Peculiarities of Style. — Statuary.—
The Nereids. — Their Significance. — Sculptures of Heroon at Gjblbaschi. — Their Subjects.—
Deeds of Ulysses depicted. — Other Scenes. — Influence of Painting. — Resemblance to Style of
Nereid Monument. — Art in Southern Italy and Sicily. — Patronage of Art by the Tyrants. —
Temple-ruins at Acragas. — Ruins at Selinus.—The Metope representing Fate of Actaion.—
General Review of this Period.
So far as our literary sources go, we find, that, in the Peloponnesos during
the latter half of the fifth century B.C., no other centre vied with Argos in the
name and fame of its sculptors; although Sikyon and other places shared in its
artistic life. From the inland province, Arcadia, there are preserved to us the
names of only four sculptors, — Dameas, Athenodoros, Samolas, and Nicoda-
mos. The first two were scholars of the great Polycleitos, and took part in
the mammoth Aigospotamoi gift at Delphi. Of the remaining two we only
know that Samolas executed a part of the gift for Tegea described on p. 395,
and that Nicodamos had several statues of athletes, as well as an Athena, and
boy Heracles slaying with his arrows the Nemean lion, all in Olympia.?6' In
antiquity the home of these men, the rocky and inaccessible Arcadia, does not
seem to have attracted travellers mainly on account of its art or trade, but by
reason of the sanctity of its shrines. At Bassai, near Phigaleia, among its high
mountains, are the ruins of one of these temples, once adorned with the admir-
ably preserved sculptures now removed to the British Museum. Ictinos, the
celebrated architect of the Parthenon, erected here, on the site of a more
ancient shrine, this temple to Apollo Epicurios, who was worshipped as the
god of healing, and believed to have kept off pestilence from the land.?62
The columns of this temple, on a salubrious bluff three thousand feet above
the level of the sea, still overlook the land spread out at their feet, command-
ing ravishing views of mountain and plain away to the blue waters on the
397
SCULPTURE OUTSIDE OF ATTICA DURING THE SECOND HALF OF THE FIFTH
CENTURY (concluded).
Artists of this Period. — Phigaleia Sculptures. — Apollo Epicurios. — Metopes.— Frieze. — Its Subjects.
Passionateness in Treatment. — Contrast to Attic Friezes. — Affinities in Style. — Sculpture in
other Parts of Peloponnesos. — Paionios of Mende. — His Nike. — Its Discovery. — Its Recent
Restoration. — Description of the Nike. — Its Boldness, etc. — Comparison with other Works. —
Affinities with Nereid Monument. — Art on the Islands. — Delian Sculptures. — Comparison
drawn between them and Paionios' Nike. — Explanation of Resemblances and Differences. —
Colotes. — Lykia. — Sculptures from Xanthos. — Tomb. — Peculiarities of Style. — Statuary.—
The Nereids. — Their Significance. — Sculptures of Heroon at Gjblbaschi. — Their Subjects.—
Deeds of Ulysses depicted. — Other Scenes. — Influence of Painting. — Resemblance to Style of
Nereid Monument. — Art in Southern Italy and Sicily. — Patronage of Art by the Tyrants. —
Temple-ruins at Acragas. — Ruins at Selinus.—The Metope representing Fate of Actaion.—
General Review of this Period.
So far as our literary sources go, we find, that, in the Peloponnesos during
the latter half of the fifth century B.C., no other centre vied with Argos in the
name and fame of its sculptors; although Sikyon and other places shared in its
artistic life. From the inland province, Arcadia, there are preserved to us the
names of only four sculptors, — Dameas, Athenodoros, Samolas, and Nicoda-
mos. The first two were scholars of the great Polycleitos, and took part in
the mammoth Aigospotamoi gift at Delphi. Of the remaining two we only
know that Samolas executed a part of the gift for Tegea described on p. 395,
and that Nicodamos had several statues of athletes, as well as an Athena, and
boy Heracles slaying with his arrows the Nemean lion, all in Olympia.?6' In
antiquity the home of these men, the rocky and inaccessible Arcadia, does not
seem to have attracted travellers mainly on account of its art or trade, but by
reason of the sanctity of its shrines. At Bassai, near Phigaleia, among its high
mountains, are the ruins of one of these temples, once adorned with the admir-
ably preserved sculptures now removed to the British Museum. Ictinos, the
celebrated architect of the Parthenon, erected here, on the site of a more
ancient shrine, this temple to Apollo Epicurios, who was worshipped as the
god of healing, and believed to have kept off pestilence from the land.?62
The columns of this temple, on a salubrious bluff three thousand feet above
the level of the sea, still overlook the land spread out at their feet, command-
ing ravishing views of mountain and plain away to the blue waters on the
397