DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.8577#0087
VII
NATURAL HISTORY
AS we have seen, the list of animals and fabulous creatures which appear
on Corinthian vases is a very long one, for the 'Corinthian' period not
only inherited all the motives regularly used by Protocorinthian artists, but
also added a great many to these. To write the history of these motives
individually would require far more space than is available on the present
occasion; the most that can now be done is to provide a brief commentary
on the more important subjects, and to make a bare enumeration of the rest.
Lions are by far the commonest of the oriental animals on Protocorinthian
vases; panthers, which begin to displace lions in the early Corinthian period,
and do so almost completely in the second quarter of the sixth century, only
become common on late Protocorinthian vases. One notices the same process
in Attic vase-painting: the panther first appears in the vases of the Nessos
group;1 by the time of the Tyrrhenian vases, as Thiersch has pointed out, it
has virtually monopolized the field.
There can be little doubt that Protocorinthian and Corinthian lions go back
to different oriental models: there is, of course, no sharp break in the tradi-
tion, but there are marked and consistent differences, not only in the render-
ing of details, but also in general character. It is not difficult to point to the
two oriental traditions which lie behind these types; the Protocorinthian
lion is Hittite in origin, the Corinthian, Assyrian. It is probable that the
Protocorinthian artists first became acquainted with Hittite (North Syrian)
models through the medium of early Cretan art; at any rate this seems
likely to be true of sculptural types. For early Cretan and Cypriote lions are
unquestionably based on Hittite originals, and one at least of the Cretan
examples is almost identical, even in small details, with a well established
Protocorinthian form.2 The same type is found farther north in the eastern
Aegean, where it may have been derived independently from the East.3
The characteristics of this type are the extreme breadth and squareness of
the head, whether seen from the front or from the side; further, the shortness
of the upper contour from the beginning of the mane to the nose, and the
great depth from the nose down to the chin. But the lions illustrated in
figs. 71-5 make it easy to compare the types in question, and render further
description unnecessary.
The case for the Hittite origin of the painted Protocorinthian types is, to
1 That is, the group of the Nessos amphora: examples: fig. 74A-b (cf. Pottier, Syria ii, 6 ff.;
Furtwangler,Kl. Schr. ii, pi. 22; Graf pi. 14, 385,&c. Ausgrab. in Sendschirli pis. 45, 47 &c, &c).
2 Cypriote and Cretan lions of Hittite type : fig. 74 3 Fig. 75, Hogarth, Ephesus pi. 21, 3 (Poulsen,
c-d: Myres, Cesnola Handbook 1393, p. 242; Liv. Orient 104, fig. 111). Poulsen, loc. cit., also remarks
Ann. 1925 pi. 2; with the latter, compare the Proto- the Hittite origin of the Ephesian and Cypriote
corinthian lions pi. 1-7, and figs. 71-3. Hittite examples just mentioned.
NATURAL HISTORY
AS we have seen, the list of animals and fabulous creatures which appear
on Corinthian vases is a very long one, for the 'Corinthian' period not
only inherited all the motives regularly used by Protocorinthian artists, but
also added a great many to these. To write the history of these motives
individually would require far more space than is available on the present
occasion; the most that can now be done is to provide a brief commentary
on the more important subjects, and to make a bare enumeration of the rest.
Lions are by far the commonest of the oriental animals on Protocorinthian
vases; panthers, which begin to displace lions in the early Corinthian period,
and do so almost completely in the second quarter of the sixth century, only
become common on late Protocorinthian vases. One notices the same process
in Attic vase-painting: the panther first appears in the vases of the Nessos
group;1 by the time of the Tyrrhenian vases, as Thiersch has pointed out, it
has virtually monopolized the field.
There can be little doubt that Protocorinthian and Corinthian lions go back
to different oriental models: there is, of course, no sharp break in the tradi-
tion, but there are marked and consistent differences, not only in the render-
ing of details, but also in general character. It is not difficult to point to the
two oriental traditions which lie behind these types; the Protocorinthian
lion is Hittite in origin, the Corinthian, Assyrian. It is probable that the
Protocorinthian artists first became acquainted with Hittite (North Syrian)
models through the medium of early Cretan art; at any rate this seems
likely to be true of sculptural types. For early Cretan and Cypriote lions are
unquestionably based on Hittite originals, and one at least of the Cretan
examples is almost identical, even in small details, with a well established
Protocorinthian form.2 The same type is found farther north in the eastern
Aegean, where it may have been derived independently from the East.3
The characteristics of this type are the extreme breadth and squareness of
the head, whether seen from the front or from the side; further, the shortness
of the upper contour from the beginning of the mane to the nose, and the
great depth from the nose down to the chin. But the lions illustrated in
figs. 71-5 make it easy to compare the types in question, and render further
description unnecessary.
The case for the Hittite origin of the painted Protocorinthian types is, to
1 That is, the group of the Nessos amphora: examples: fig. 74A-b (cf. Pottier, Syria ii, 6 ff.;
Furtwangler,Kl. Schr. ii, pi. 22; Graf pi. 14, 385,&c. Ausgrab. in Sendschirli pis. 45, 47 &c, &c).
2 Cypriote and Cretan lions of Hittite type : fig. 74 3 Fig. 75, Hogarth, Ephesus pi. 21, 3 (Poulsen,
c-d: Myres, Cesnola Handbook 1393, p. 242; Liv. Orient 104, fig. 111). Poulsen, loc. cit., also remarks
Ann. 1925 pi. 2; with the latter, compare the Proto- the Hittite origin of the Ephesian and Cypriote
corinthian lions pi. 1-7, and figs. 71-3. Hittite examples just mentioned.