DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52591#0139
THE TREASURY OF THE SIPHNIANS 123
the vertical fillet, which encloses the scene, a fully armed
warrior with shield and greaves, Ares,
But there are traces of other divine figures now lost. On
Zeus’s lap rest two fingers, and a break before his knee
shows that here sat a little figure, lower on a stool and
familiarly turned towards Zeus.1 In the other group before
Athena is the trace of the back of a chair, on which probably
sat Hera. The composition thus seems to have been as
follows 8 : in the centre Zeus with a little maidservant
before his knee, certainly Hebe; to the right Hera, Athena,
and two goddesses, probably Demeter and Kore (fig. 43);
to the left, behind Zeus’s back, the above-named four divi-
nities, so a completely symmetrical arrangement of the great
gods with Zeus as the central point. Heberdey and Karo’s
proposal to divide the groups of gods and put the battle
for Patroclus's body in the centre is rendered impossible
by the vertical fillets closing the scene before the ends of
both friezes, and, moreover, by the fact that both the
furthest slabs bend round the corners to north and south
respectively. The gods are not divided as in the Parthenon
frieze : they sit in a circle in their Olympus, strongly moved
by the fighting of the mortals, and divided according to
partisanship, the gods to the right of Zeus being for the
Greeks, those on his left for the Trojans in the Homeric
description. The scene best answers to the beginning of
the fourth book, where the assembled gods have a lively
debate. But the lively gathering of gods is also suitable
as an accompaniment to the battle scenes of the seventeenth
book, for here too we hear of the active participation of
the gods : several times Apollo goes out, disguises himself,
and encourages Hector, while Zeus nods in exasperation
when Hector has taken Achilles' armour off Patroclus. The
sculptor never follows the poem slavishly, but makes the
alterations his art requires.
Naturally it caused no’small astonishment to find in this
frieze a plastic representation of gods assembled, about a
century earlier than the famous gathering of the gods in
the frieze of the Parthenon, and in both cases to see Ares
1 Karo, op. cit., 269.
2 Lechat, Revue des etudes anciennes, xiii, 1911, 398 and note 3.
the vertical fillet, which encloses the scene, a fully armed
warrior with shield and greaves, Ares,
But there are traces of other divine figures now lost. On
Zeus’s lap rest two fingers, and a break before his knee
shows that here sat a little figure, lower on a stool and
familiarly turned towards Zeus.1 In the other group before
Athena is the trace of the back of a chair, on which probably
sat Hera. The composition thus seems to have been as
follows 8 : in the centre Zeus with a little maidservant
before his knee, certainly Hebe; to the right Hera, Athena,
and two goddesses, probably Demeter and Kore (fig. 43);
to the left, behind Zeus’s back, the above-named four divi-
nities, so a completely symmetrical arrangement of the great
gods with Zeus as the central point. Heberdey and Karo’s
proposal to divide the groups of gods and put the battle
for Patroclus's body in the centre is rendered impossible
by the vertical fillets closing the scene before the ends of
both friezes, and, moreover, by the fact that both the
furthest slabs bend round the corners to north and south
respectively. The gods are not divided as in the Parthenon
frieze : they sit in a circle in their Olympus, strongly moved
by the fighting of the mortals, and divided according to
partisanship, the gods to the right of Zeus being for the
Greeks, those on his left for the Trojans in the Homeric
description. The scene best answers to the beginning of
the fourth book, where the assembled gods have a lively
debate. But the lively gathering of gods is also suitable
as an accompaniment to the battle scenes of the seventeenth
book, for here too we hear of the active participation of
the gods : several times Apollo goes out, disguises himself,
and encourages Hector, while Zeus nods in exasperation
when Hector has taken Achilles' armour off Patroclus. The
sculptor never follows the poem slavishly, but makes the
alterations his art requires.
Naturally it caused no’small astonishment to find in this
frieze a plastic representation of gods assembled, about a
century earlier than the famous gathering of the gods in
the frieze of the Parthenon, and in both cases to see Ares
1 Karo, op. cit., 269.
2 Lechat, Revue des etudes anciennes, xiii, 1911, 398 and note 3.