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Perry, Walter Copland
Greek and Roman sculpture: a popular introduction to the history of Greek and Roman sculpture — London, 1882

DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.14144#0246

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2io CONTEMPORARIES AND PUPILS OF PIIE/DIAS.

Praxias and Androsthenes of Athens,

01. 85-90 (B.C. 440-420).

Although these artists were not pupils of Pheidias, they belong to
his period, and were employed in the plastic decoration of the Temple
of Apollo at Delphi.1 The pedimental group of this temple contained
statues of Artemis, Leto, the Muses, Helios (setting), Dionysos, and the
Thyiadcs (Bacchantes). The first mentioned of these were executed
by Praxias, but as he died in the middle of his work, the group was
completed by another Athenian, Androsthenes, a pupil of Eucadmus.
The only direct evidence of their belonging to this period is the fact
that Praxias is called a pupil of Calamis, whose prime fell about
Ol. 80 (B.C. 460). We may assume therefore that Praxias was actively
exercising his art between the 85th and 90th Ol. (440-420 B.C.). An
interesting confirmation of this hypothesis has been pointed out by
Welcker in a chorus of the ' Ion' of Euripides, which directly refers
to the sculptures described by Pausanias:—

Ovk iv Tttis (aOiais 'Add-

vuls evKioves f](rav uv-

Aoi Sewv fiuvou, ov$' dyvi-

ariSes1 vepaureiat'

dWd Ka\ napa Ao£m

™ Aarovs dibvpiov 717)00-0)-

nau KaWifiXtyapov cpas.'2

Not alone did lordly Athens pillared courts for prayer upraise,
Or perform the vow to Phcebus, guardian of the city ways :
Here we hail a kindred glory, where within the Delphic shrine
Splendour crowns the radiant faces of Latona's twins divine.—H. A. P.

If, as Welcker3 assumes, this tragedy was first brought on to the stage
in 01. 89 (B.C. 424), or a little later, the sculptures of the Delphian
Temple must have been already in their places in the pediment at

1 Pausan. x. 19. 4. Conf. Welcker, Alt. 3 Alt. Dcnkm. i. 151. Conf. Brunn,
Denkm. i. 151. = Eurip. Ion, 1S4. JCOnstter-Geschichte, i. 24S.
 
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