DOI chapter:
Division E: The west slope of the Acropolis, the Areopagus, and Academy suburb
DOI chapter:Section XXII
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61302#0725
SEC. XXII
OF ANCIENT ATHENS
549
here there is no doubt that Pan is looking out from his Athenian
cave. Above the design is inscribed-
ΑΡΧΑΝΔΡ[Ο]Σ : ΝΥΝΦΑΙΣΚΑ[ΙΠΑΝI]
■—(“Archandros to the Nymphs and [to Pan]”). Here un-
doubtedly the Nymphs are figured, but they are of the Charites
type—the centre figure fronting, the other two sideways.
A very beautiful fragment of a similar scene, also found at Athens,
is preserved in the Acropolis Museum (fig. 11). Pan is seated
piping, but only his hairy legs remain, and enough of his arms to
show by the pose that he held his pipes ; to him approaches one
woman figure heavily veiled, but whether a worshipper or a
Charis or a Nymph can scarcely be determined, as the slab is
broken.
It may be taken that the type of the three Charites in art certainly
existed from early times at Athens, and it seems probable that this
type influenced analogous representations of the more widely
popular Nymphs. When the scene of the dance takes place in a
cave and is presided over by Pan, I think it is fairly certain that
the Nymphs are pictured. In actual stone images they might be
seen within many a woodland cave. Just such a sight Longus 13
describes in his pastoral romance of Daphnis and Chloe :—“ There
was a grotto sacred to the Nymphs. It was a spacious rock,
concave within, convex without. The images of the Nymphs
themselves were carved in stone ; their feet were bare, their
arms naked to the shoulder, their hair falling dishevelled upon
their shoulders, their raiment girt about their waists, a smile upon
their brow ; their whole semblance was like a troop of dancers.
The dome of the grotto rose midway over the rock ; water, spring-
ing from a well, ran freely, and a trim meadow stretched green and
abundant before the entrance, fed by the water’s dew. Within
were milk-pails and cross flutes, flageolets, and shepherd’s pipes
suspended, the offering of many an aged herdsman.”
Pan is the god of Arcadia, and any detailed examination of
the origin and development of his cult is out of place at Athens.
When the Athenians gave him his cave on the Acropolis he was
still the cheerful healthy rustic, he was not yet the love-sick boy
who pined for Syrinx, not yet the great god at whose death
mysterious voices echoed over the midnight sea. There is no god
with whose personality modern imagination has played stranger
tricks. To study the development of his mythology is to follow
out the whole history of man’s attitude towards nature for twenty
OF ANCIENT ATHENS
549
here there is no doubt that Pan is looking out from his Athenian
cave. Above the design is inscribed-
ΑΡΧΑΝΔΡ[Ο]Σ : ΝΥΝΦΑΙΣΚΑ[ΙΠΑΝI]
■—(“Archandros to the Nymphs and [to Pan]”). Here un-
doubtedly the Nymphs are figured, but they are of the Charites
type—the centre figure fronting, the other two sideways.
A very beautiful fragment of a similar scene, also found at Athens,
is preserved in the Acropolis Museum (fig. 11). Pan is seated
piping, but only his hairy legs remain, and enough of his arms to
show by the pose that he held his pipes ; to him approaches one
woman figure heavily veiled, but whether a worshipper or a
Charis or a Nymph can scarcely be determined, as the slab is
broken.
It may be taken that the type of the three Charites in art certainly
existed from early times at Athens, and it seems probable that this
type influenced analogous representations of the more widely
popular Nymphs. When the scene of the dance takes place in a
cave and is presided over by Pan, I think it is fairly certain that
the Nymphs are pictured. In actual stone images they might be
seen within many a woodland cave. Just such a sight Longus 13
describes in his pastoral romance of Daphnis and Chloe :—“ There
was a grotto sacred to the Nymphs. It was a spacious rock,
concave within, convex without. The images of the Nymphs
themselves were carved in stone ; their feet were bare, their
arms naked to the shoulder, their hair falling dishevelled upon
their shoulders, their raiment girt about their waists, a smile upon
their brow ; their whole semblance was like a troop of dancers.
The dome of the grotto rose midway over the rock ; water, spring-
ing from a well, ran freely, and a trim meadow stretched green and
abundant before the entrance, fed by the water’s dew. Within
were milk-pails and cross flutes, flageolets, and shepherd’s pipes
suspended, the offering of many an aged herdsman.”
Pan is the god of Arcadia, and any detailed examination of
the origin and development of his cult is out of place at Athens.
When the Athenians gave him his cave on the Acropolis he was
still the cheerful healthy rustic, he was not yet the love-sick boy
who pined for Syrinx, not yet the great god at whose death
mysterious voices echoed over the midnight sea. There is no god
with whose personality modern imagination has played stranger
tricks. To study the development of his mythology is to follow
out the whole history of man’s attitude towards nature for twenty