DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.8577#0078
VI
THE MIDDLE AND LATE CORINTHIAN ORIENTALIZING
STYLES
THE classification of the orientalizing vases which belong to the sixth
century presents many difficult problems, some of them apparently at
present insoluble. The principal difficulty is in distinguishing the vases of
the early sixth century from those of the late seventh, for, as I said in the last
chapter, the lower limits of the early style are ill-defined. The course of
development from the late seventh century to the middle of the sixth is per-
fectly clear; the problem is therefore not to say where a particular style of
decoration belongs typologically, but to determine during what period it was
actually current. This is certainly the less interesting of the two main prob-
lems, but it is none the less important. There are many cases in which we
cannot answer questions of this kind until we have the evidence of a much
longer series of graves than is at present available.
Although to do so will involve a certain amount of anticipation, I think
that the best way of outlining the development in the first half of the sixth
century will be to state the evidence by which we can distinguish the latest
phase of the orientalizing style. This phase presents a very well-defined
contrast with that of the early Corinthian period; so that, with the beginning
and the end of the story clearly determined, we shall be in a fair position to
form an idea of the intermediate stages.
Now there is one class of vases which, for a variety of reasons, is generally
admitted to belong to a late date. In these the design is painted, not on the
natural whitish surface of the clay, but on an artificially prepared red back-
ground. This innovation may well have had technical advantages, as a
recent writer has suggested;1 in any case its adoption at Corinth in the second
quarter of the sixth century is certainly to be connected with the introduction
of a similar scheme of colouring into Attic vase-painting about the year 580
B.C.2 The resemblances between these red-ground Corinthian and Attic vases
are manifold; there are countless points of stylistic contact between the two
groups which make it quite certain that the Corinthian red-ground style is to
be placed, roughly speaking, in the second quarter of the sixth century.
The Late Orientalizing Style.
The majority of the Corinthian red-ground vases, and nearly all the most
interesting examples, are decorated with narrative scenes; but most of them
have orientalizing decoration as well, and not a few are decorated solely with
orientalizing motives. These, then, will give us an idea of the orientalizing
style in the late Corinthian period, or at any rate of one phase of it.
1 Massoul, Rev. Arch. 1925, ii, 130. with the clay, not laid on the outside as invariably at
2 The red on Attic vases is of course always mixed Corinth.
THE MIDDLE AND LATE CORINTHIAN ORIENTALIZING
STYLES
THE classification of the orientalizing vases which belong to the sixth
century presents many difficult problems, some of them apparently at
present insoluble. The principal difficulty is in distinguishing the vases of
the early sixth century from those of the late seventh, for, as I said in the last
chapter, the lower limits of the early style are ill-defined. The course of
development from the late seventh century to the middle of the sixth is per-
fectly clear; the problem is therefore not to say where a particular style of
decoration belongs typologically, but to determine during what period it was
actually current. This is certainly the less interesting of the two main prob-
lems, but it is none the less important. There are many cases in which we
cannot answer questions of this kind until we have the evidence of a much
longer series of graves than is at present available.
Although to do so will involve a certain amount of anticipation, I think
that the best way of outlining the development in the first half of the sixth
century will be to state the evidence by which we can distinguish the latest
phase of the orientalizing style. This phase presents a very well-defined
contrast with that of the early Corinthian period; so that, with the beginning
and the end of the story clearly determined, we shall be in a fair position to
form an idea of the intermediate stages.
Now there is one class of vases which, for a variety of reasons, is generally
admitted to belong to a late date. In these the design is painted, not on the
natural whitish surface of the clay, but on an artificially prepared red back-
ground. This innovation may well have had technical advantages, as a
recent writer has suggested;1 in any case its adoption at Corinth in the second
quarter of the sixth century is certainly to be connected with the introduction
of a similar scheme of colouring into Attic vase-painting about the year 580
B.C.2 The resemblances between these red-ground Corinthian and Attic vases
are manifold; there are countless points of stylistic contact between the two
groups which make it quite certain that the Corinthian red-ground style is to
be placed, roughly speaking, in the second quarter of the sixth century.
The Late Orientalizing Style.
The majority of the Corinthian red-ground vases, and nearly all the most
interesting examples, are decorated with narrative scenes; but most of them
have orientalizing decoration as well, and not a few are decorated solely with
orientalizing motives. These, then, will give us an idea of the orientalizing
style in the late Corinthian period, or at any rate of one phase of it.
1 Massoul, Rev. Arch. 1925, ii, 130. with the clay, not laid on the outside as invariably at
2 The red on Attic vases is of course always mixed Corinth.