DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.52591#0157
THE TREASURY OF THE SIPHNIANS 141
When the reliefs were discovered, they were richly
painted, and still the colours have not all faded.1 As was
indicated in the treatment of the metopes of the Sicyonian
Treasury, the background was blue. The figures are
treated in blue, green, and red, the last colour in two shades,
light red and golden-red. The clothes are red with blue
borders, while the colours are changed when two or more
articles of clothes or armour are worn. The helmets are
blue, with red ornamental stripes on the edges, to pick
them out from the blue background; the last feature
reminds one of the little red nimbus which in red-figured
vases divides the dark hair of the figures from the dark
ground. The outsides of the shields are alternately blue
and red, their insides red, with a narrow colourless border
along the edge, a colour scheme answering exactly to that
of figures on the Aeginetan pediment. The bodies of
Cybele's lions are colourless, but the manes, harness, and
yoke are red. The tails and manes of the horses are red,
or where several are seen close together, alternately red and
blue.
The style is Ionic, and the examination of this frieze shows
how far in the last decade of the sixth century B.c. Ionic
art was ahead of Attic, as we know from the finds on the
Acropolis of Athens, a result arrived at on the basis of a
study of the Korai themselves and the other archaic sculp-
tures of the “ Perserschutt.” 2 Only after the Persian Wars
does Athens become what previously it had been only in
vase-painting, the capital of Greek art. Siphnos itself was
never an art centre, and it would be absurd to ascribe to
the little island the honour of this fine art, executed by
artists who were probably at home on the coast of Asia
Minor. That is indicated by stylistic agreement with the
scanty remains of the cornice frieze of the Artemision at
Ephesus, the last part of the plastic decoration of the temple
to be executed, which can be dated at 525 b.c., which is
just the time of the Siphnian frieze.3 The work itself
must have been executed at Delphi, for site and building
1 Bull, de corr. hell., 1893, 194 ; Furtwangler, Aegina, 306 f.
2 Dickins, Catalogue of the Acropolis Museum, 19 ff.
3 Lethaby, Journal of Hellenic Studies, xxxvii, 1917, 3 f. 4
When the reliefs were discovered, they were richly
painted, and still the colours have not all faded.1 As was
indicated in the treatment of the metopes of the Sicyonian
Treasury, the background was blue. The figures are
treated in blue, green, and red, the last colour in two shades,
light red and golden-red. The clothes are red with blue
borders, while the colours are changed when two or more
articles of clothes or armour are worn. The helmets are
blue, with red ornamental stripes on the edges, to pick
them out from the blue background; the last feature
reminds one of the little red nimbus which in red-figured
vases divides the dark hair of the figures from the dark
ground. The outsides of the shields are alternately blue
and red, their insides red, with a narrow colourless border
along the edge, a colour scheme answering exactly to that
of figures on the Aeginetan pediment. The bodies of
Cybele's lions are colourless, but the manes, harness, and
yoke are red. The tails and manes of the horses are red,
or where several are seen close together, alternately red and
blue.
The style is Ionic, and the examination of this frieze shows
how far in the last decade of the sixth century B.c. Ionic
art was ahead of Attic, as we know from the finds on the
Acropolis of Athens, a result arrived at on the basis of a
study of the Korai themselves and the other archaic sculp-
tures of the “ Perserschutt.” 2 Only after the Persian Wars
does Athens become what previously it had been only in
vase-painting, the capital of Greek art. Siphnos itself was
never an art centre, and it would be absurd to ascribe to
the little island the honour of this fine art, executed by
artists who were probably at home on the coast of Asia
Minor. That is indicated by stylistic agreement with the
scanty remains of the cornice frieze of the Artemision at
Ephesus, the last part of the plastic decoration of the temple
to be executed, which can be dated at 525 b.c., which is
just the time of the Siphnian frieze.3 The work itself
must have been executed at Delphi, for site and building
1 Bull, de corr. hell., 1893, 194 ; Furtwangler, Aegina, 306 f.
2 Dickins, Catalogue of the Acropolis Museum, 19 ff.
3 Lethaby, Journal of Hellenic Studies, xxxvii, 1917, 3 f. 4