Persepolis, Palace.
Stone.
Fifth century BCE.
Persepolis, Iran.
H 40 in., W 60 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 187.

This is part of a relief representing one corner of a canopy above the image of the king. From the side of a doorway to the Hall of One Hundred Columns at Persepolis. Rows of rosettes separate rows of bulls and of lions. At the head of each file of animals is a winged disk. The cast was made from a mold taken in Persepolis in 1892 by the plaster-maker Lorenzo Giuntini (1844-1920), son of an Italian plaster-maker, and an English mother. Giuntini accompanied Herbert Weld Blundell on an expedition to Persepolis in 1891-1892, to make casts of the reliefs. Thereafter the molds were destroyed. This and other of Giuntin's casts from Persepolis are preserved in the British Museum.


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Bibliography

See Cecil H. Smith, Catalogue of Casts of Sculptures from Persepolis (London, 1892). Figure 1.]]>
Ashmole and Yalouris fig. N.
H 55 in., W 72 in., D 17 1/2 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 468.
Cast Location: SUB I- 2nd floor

This Old Seer is one of the onlookers at the chariot race, which has not yet begun. The old man knits his brow and opens his mouth slightly in horror at his knowledge of what is about to happen. An uneven seam around the right shoulder shows where the cast-makers reconstructed parts of this figure that were missing on the marble original. The restorations of this and all the casts were overseen by Georg Treu (1843-1921), director of the German excavations at Olympia from 1875 to 1881, and curator of sculpture in Dresden's Albertinum from 1882 to 1915.
~Nathan Barber


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Bibliography

See Bernard Ashmole and Nicholas Yalouris, Olympia. The Sculptures of the Temple of Zeus (London, 1967), fig. N, pls. 31-40.]]>
Ashmole and Yalouris figs. B and E.
Lifesize, W 39 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 468.
Cast Location: Mason Hall- Stairwell facing Concert Hall

The naked boy sits on a flattened piece of drapery that folds over his left arm and fingers one of his toes, waiting quietly but nervously for the chariot race between Pelops and Oenomaus to begin. The head of the marble boy is missing, but the cast-makers were evidently not comfortable with the sculpture in that condition, so they attached a new head to the plaster, this one a cast taken from the head of a somewhat older kneeling youth in the east pediment of the temple. Figure 4. Figure 4 before cleaning and joining of two separate plaster sections.


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Bibliography


See Bernard Ashmole and Nicholas Yalouris, Olympia. The Sculptures of the Temple of Zeus (London, 1967), fig. E, pls. 41-43, and fig. B pls. 50-52 .]]>
Ashmole and Yalouris figs. L and N.
H 15 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 469.


About half of this head was preserved, but not the nose, the lower part of the face, or the beard. Georg Treu at the Albertinum in Dresden had all these segments restored when casts was produced, so as to make a complete head. The curving seams delineate what was replaced. The right side of the face and 34head is original, and comes from the head of what has been identified as another "Seer" in the east pediment (figure L). The beard appears to be molded from that of the Old Seer in the east pediment (figure N, and above no. 3). Fig. 5.


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Bibiiography


See Bernard Ashmole and Nicholas Yalouris, Olympia. The Sculptures of the Temple of Zeus (London, 1967),fig. N pls. 31-38.]]>
Pentelic marble.
447-438 BCE.
London, British Museum.
H 40 in., W 41 - 48 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: All casts are no. 530.
Long-term loans.
Cast Location: Harris Theatre Lobby

The frieze from the Parthenon represents a procession to the Akropolis of Athenians celebrating the Panathenaia, a festival held every four years to honor Athena, the city's patron deity. There were athletic competitions, sacrifices, and the procession culminating in the presentation of a new peplos (dress) that was draped over an ancient wooden image of the goddess. The Parthenon's continuous frieze, to which these three slabs belonged, was sculpted in low relief and surrounded the entire building within the peristyle (colonnade). These riders on galloping horses are most likely to represent the tribes of Athens gathering to compete in the Panathenaic Games and to celebrate the birthday of Athena. In the early nineteenth century, much of the Parthenon’s 515-foot frieze was removed from the building and shipped to London, where the blocks now remain on view in the British Museum. Those blocks that are in Athens are on exhibit in the new Akropolis Museum. Cast no. 8 is in need of repair.  

~Kristin Ware


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Bibliography


See Ian Jenkins, The Parthenon Frieze (London, 2002); Frank Brommer, Sculptures of the Parthenon (1979); A. H. Smith, A Catalogue of Sculpture in the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities, British Museum,vol. 1 (London, 1892), 91-192. Fig. 6. Fig. 7.]]>
Probably found in Rome.
Marble.
Roman, Neo-Attic in style.
Madrid, Archaeological Museum no. 2691.
H 39 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 508.
Long-term loan.
Cast Location: Mason Hall Atrium

This marble well-head was probably made in Rome during the later first century CE, and may have ornamented a luxuriously appointed Roman garden. Its subject is a reflection of the scene of the Birth of Athena as it was carved for the east pediment (gable) of the Parthenon (448-432 BCE) in Athens. Since those figures from the Parthenon have been lost, this relief has served scholars as a guide in reconstructing the original appearance of the scene. Zeus, seated on his throne, is the central figure. Behind him stands Hephaistos with the mallet that he has just used to crack open Zeus's forehead. To the right of Zeus, a Nike (Victory) holding a victor's wreath flies towards Athena, who has just sprung from her father's forehead. Fully grown and wearing chiton, himation, aegis, and helmet, Athena carries a round shield on her left arm. To the right of Athena are the three Fates, spinning the thread of life.
~Helen Watson Obiechina


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Bibliography


See Ian Jenkins, The Parthenon Sculptures (Cambridge, Mass., 2007); Evelyn B. Harrison, "Athena and Athens in the East Pediment of the Parthenon," American Journal of Archaeology 71, 1967, 27-80; Rhys Carpenter, "The Lost Statues of the East Pediment of the Parthenon," Hesperia 2, 1933, 1-88. Figure 9. Figure. photograph of no. 9 by Andrew Zimmerman. Figure. Anonymous engraving, early 19th century. Rolled-out view of the Madrid Puteal.]]>
Marble. 323-322 BCE.
Athens, Akropolis Museum no. 1338.
H 13 in., L 36 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 927.
Cast Location: Robinson B359 Hallway

The marble relief of armed dancers is part of one side of an inscribed base for a statue dedicated by Atarbos in honor of victory in the pyrrhic dance at the Panathenaic Games. A second block with more figures in relief joins this one. At the left of this block, the chorus leader, wearing a chiton and himation, inclines her head in the direction of two groups of four dancers each. The naked men wear small Attic helmets, carry round shields on outstretched left arms, and clench their lowered right hands. They walk in step, rhythmically and gracefully, right foot forward, left foot back, their bodies turned slightly outwards. The name of Atarbos can easily be distinguished at the center of the inscription on the molding above the dancers.



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Bibliography


See Inscriptiones Graecae 2.2, 3025; A. Kosmopoulou, “The Relief Base of Atarbos, Akropolis Museum 1338,” in K. Hartswick and M. Sturgeon eds., Stephanos. Studies in Honor of Brunilde Sismondo Ridgway (Philadelphia, 1998); http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/artifact?name=Athens, Acropolis 1338&object=Sculp Fig. 10.]]>
From Athens, west slope of the Akropolis, 1880.
Marble. Ca. 300 BCE.
Athens, Akropolis Museum no. 1326.
H 18 in., W 12 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 924.


This relief was once on one side of the base for a statue. The subject represented is a competition in the Panathenaic festival, in which a nude competitor with helmet and shield jumped off and on a speeding four-horse chariot driven by a charioteer. The monument of which this relief was a part was probably a votive offering from a victor in this Athenian competition.


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Bibliography


See Loula Kypreou, The Acropolis of Athens and its Museum (Athens, 1972), 45 and 47, no. 1326. Fig. 11.]]>
Found in the 1830s by William Martin Leake (1777-1860) at Thebes in Boeotia (Greece), given to the British Museum in 1839.
Marble.
Probably late Classical.
British Museum, GR 1839.8-6.4.
H 14 in., W 12 1/2 in.
Metropolitan Catalogue: Cast no. 935.
Cast Location: Robinson B359 Hallway

Two vertical braids of hair between two pilasters adorn this votive relief in the form of an aedicule (chapel). The architrave is inscribed: "Philombrotus and Apthenetus, sons of Deinomachus, dedicate this offering to Poseidon." Leake found the relief at the site of a temple to Poseidon near the sea and thus at the edge of Theban territory. Ancient literary sources attest to the practice of offering one's hair to Poseidon after surviving a shipwreck, and Leake assumed that the dedicators "were probably about to encounter, or had escaped from some peril at sea." Hair was dedicated to various gods as an act of piety, to judge from ancient literary references to the practice. The hair itself might be hung from a tree in a sacred grove, or enclosed in a container and dedicated in a sanctuary, or, as in this case, a more expensive marble dedication might be offered to Poseidon. The dedication of an image of their braids by Philombrotus and Aphthonetus might best be seen as both an act of gratitude, and a vow to dedicate themselves to Poseidon for the rest of their lives, leaving behind that physical state in which they had been close to death.
~Lucy R. Miller


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Bibliography


See William Martin Leake, Travels in Northern Greece. London, 1835/Amsterdam, 1967, 360-361; James Milligen. Ancient Unedited Monuments. London, 1722, 32; C. T. Newton, ed. Ancient Greek Inscriptions in the British Museum. Oxford, 1883, 29; A. H. Smith, A Catalogue of Sculpture in the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities, British Museum, vol. 1 (London, 1892), 366-367, no. 798; F. Van Straten, "Votives and Votaries in Greek Sanctuaries," Le Sanctuaire Grec, ed. A. Schachter. Vandoeuvres-Geneva, 1992, 10. Fig. 12.]]>
Found in Rome.
Marble.
Greek, probably late Classical.
Rome, Capitoline Museums.
H 36 in., W 12 in.
Not in Metropolitan cast catalogue.
Cast Location: Johnson Center 2nd floor

The top of the stele is missing. Carved in low relief. The now-headless profile figure of a standing girl wears a lightweight, crinkly chiton. It is possible that this relief was brought to Rome from Greece during antiquity.


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Bibliography


Fig. 13.]]>