Perseus Art and Archaeology Browser

ID:

aa_4350

Type:

Vase

Date:

ca. -480 — ca. -470

Period:

Early Classical

Context:

From Ruvo

Region:

Apulia

Painter:

Attributed to the Harrow Painter

Dimensions:

H. 0.492 m.; Diam. 0.042 m.

Ware:

Attic Red Figure

Shape:

Column krater

Shape Description

Column-krater: bulbous body tapering to a foot in two degrees, consisting of a thick torus beneath a more slender torus-riser. A red fillet separates foot and body. The side of the rim is concave and flaring.

Decoration Description

Side A: The visit of Theseus to his divine father, Poseidon, who in some accounts slept with Theseus' mother Aithra on the same night as Aigeus. Challenged by Minos to find a ring thrown into the sea, Theseus was helped by Amphitrite. In the center, Poseidon and Theseus. Poseidon wears a fillet, a dotted chiton with folds in dilute glaze, and a himation. In his left hand he holds a tall trident, which overlaps the frieze of tongues above. Theseus wears a wreath, a chitoniskos, and has a fringed shawl over his shoulders. A sword hangs in a scabbard at his waist, presumably the weapon left under a rock at Troizen by Aigeus and later found by Theseus. His hair is shorter than Poseidon's and is tied in a short queue; thinned glaze is used for his budding sideburns. He holds a round object in his left hand, possibly a fruit. Nereus and a Nereid stand at left with a slender Doric column between them. The Nereid holds a black oinochoe in her right hand and a phiale in her left, the latter lowered to pour a libation. Nereus, leaning on a tall staff, turns back to left to look at his daughter, who wears a sakkos, earrings, an embroidered peplos, a bordered himation, and a long fillet, the ends of which trail on her shoulders. The overfold of her peplos has a fringe drawn with dilute glaze. Nereus wears a chiton and bordered himation. His stubbly beard and close-cropped hair are rendered in dilute glaze. Amphitrite stands at far right, behind Theseus. She raises her right hand to crown the hero with a wreath of added red, only the ghost of which is now visible. She wears earrings, a chiton, and a himation; the end of the long fillet in her hair trails on her shoulder.

Side B: At left, a youth in a himation gestures at a bearded man, also in a himation, who carries a staff. At right is a second pair: a youth playing a kithara faced by a youth wearing a fillet and himation and leaning on his staff. The second youth is identified as a judge or trainer by the forked wand (rhabdos) in his right hand; a drop of black glaze mars his right elbow. The kitharist holds a plektron in his right hand. The left hand is not visible, and the strap that normally loops around the left wrist to hold the instrument steady so the fingers of the left hand may touch the strings is instead shown looped over a bulge in the sound box. The kitharist wears a fillet and a long gown with a black border; it is a festal gown and perhaps indicates that he is performing in an actual contest rather than just practicing (if so, the youth at right is more likely a judge than a trainer).

Pairs of horizontal palmettes decorate the side of the obverse rim, arranged back-to-back and enclosed in lyre-shaped tendrils; on the reverse is an ivy vine. Lotus buds on top of the mouth. On each handle-plate is a single black palmette framed by coiling tendrils. The scenes have lateral frames of ivy-vines and upper frames of black tongues. The groundlines are simple reserved lines. Rays on the lower body. Stripes of added red circle the lower foot, the inside of the mouth just below the rim, the top of the band of rays, and the lower body just below the groundlines.

Notes

The scene on Side A may be based on Bacchylides' account (Bacchyl. 17.97-116) of Theseus visiting Poseidon's palace; see P. Jacobsthal, Theseus auf dem Meeresgrunde (Leipzig 1911); Neils 1987, 90; and Brommer 1982, 77-83, pls. 22-23. Pausanias (Paus. 1.17.2) says the subject was depicted by the artist Mikon in a painting in a sanctuary of Theseus in Athens. Mikon's painting should date to Kimon's renovation of the Theseion, sometime between 478 and 470, so the Harrow Painter may well have drawn his inspiration from the mural. Bacchylides says Theseus received a mantle and wreath from Amphitrite, both of which he wears here; cf. the crowning of Theseus by Amphitrite on a kylix by the Briseis Painter, New York 53.11.4 (ARV2, 406,7), and a pelike by the Triptolemos Painter, Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg 2695 (ARV2, 362,19). The additional red wreath Amphitrite holds on this vase is apparently superfluous. The column indicates that the setting is the palace of Poseidon, the megaron theon mentioned by Bacchylides. On a calyx-krater by the Syriskos Painter (Paris, Cab. Md. 418; ARV2, 260,2), Amphitrite stands behind Poseidon, who shakes hands with Theseus. Sometimes only Poseidon and Theseus are represented; e.g. Yale 1913.143 (Buitron 1972, 109, no. 59). In other contexts, Theseus is also shown shaking hands with Aigeus, who welcomes him to Athens (Louvre G 195; ARV2, 381,174). Pollitt correctly interprets the scene on London E 264 (ARV2, 579,1) as Theseus shaking hands with Pittheus on his departure from Troizen: Pollitt 1987, infra. For the funerary overtones of handshaking (dexiosis), see G. Davies, AJA 89 (1985) 627-40. The back-to-back palmettes on the obverse rim are unusual ornament for a column-krater; cf. the black palmettes on Cleveland 30.104 (ARV2, 516,1). For the subject of Side B, cf. the citharist and judge on another column-krater by the Harrow Painter: Sotheby's, New York, 20, May 1982, no. 100.

Collection:

Cambridge, Harvard University Art Museums

Formerly in the collection of the Princess Tricase; later in the Garrett Chatfield Pier collection; purchased in sale of the latter in New York (American Art Association, Anderson Galleries, March 6-7, 1936, no. 4239).

Citations and Bibliography

ARV2, 274,39; Beazley Addenda 2, 207.

CVA, Robinson 2

CVA, Robinson 2, 25-27, pls. 31-33; Robinson exhibition catalogue 1961, no. 98; B. Gentili, ArchCl 6 (1954) 121-25, pls. 30-31; Neils 1987, 90 and 160, no. 48, fig. 41; J. J. Pollitt, Yale University Art Gallery Bulletin (spring 1987) 11-12, fig. 4.