California Studies in Classical Antiquity, Volume 10

By Philip Levine

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1978.

• Language: English
• Publisher: University of California Press
• Release date: Nov 15, 2023
• ISBN: 9780520312746

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California Studies in Classical Antiquity

Volume 10

CALIFORNIA STUDIES

IN

CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY

Volume 10

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS

BERKELEY — LOS ANGELES — LONDON

CALIFORNIA STUDIES IN CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY

Senior Editors: R. S. Stroud and Philip Levine

Advisory Editors: Erich Gruen, J. Puhvel, T. G. Rosenmeyer

VOLUME 10

The poppy motif used throughout California Studies in Classical Antiquity reproduces an intaglio design on a bronze finger ring of the fourth century B.C., from Olynthus: D. M. Robinson, Excavations at Olynthus 10 (Baltimore 1941) 136, pl. 26, no. 448.

ISBN: 0-520-03567-1

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 68-26906

University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles

California

University of California Press, Ltd.

London, England © 1978 by The Regents of the University of California

Printed in the United States of America

Contents 10

Contents 10

EVELYN ELIZABETH BELL Two Krokotos Mask Cups at San Simeon

MARK W. EDWARDS Agamemnon’s Decision: Freedom and Folly in Aeschylus

CHARLES W. FORNARA IG I², 39.52-57 and the Popularity of the Athenian Empire

PATRICIA A. JOHNSTON Vergil’s Conception of Saturnus

NICHOLAS JONES The Topography and Strategy of the Battle of Amphipolis in 422 B.C.

ALDEN A. MOSSHAMMER Phainias of Eresos and Chronology

FRANK J. NISETICH Convention and Occasion in Isthmian 2

RUGGIERO STEFANINI Giambattista Casti in Troy and Athens, 1788

LESLIE THREATTE Unmetrical Spellings in Attic Inscriptions

CAROLINE WEISS An Unusual Corinthian Helmet

NANCY ZUMWALT Fama Subversa: Theme and Structure in Ovid Metamorphoses 12

EVELYN ELIZABETH BELL

Two Krokotos Mask Cups at San Simeon

Masks of Dionysos decorate a small number of Attic black-figured eyecups of the period ca. 530-520 B.C. They are, for the most part, large kylikes with a diameter of 0.30 m. or more, which were probably commissioned for special occasions. Among the many black-figured drinking cups appropriately decorated with Dionysiac motifs, these with their simple, bold masks of Dionysos framed by eyes and vines are remarkable for the beauty and visual impact of their motifs.

There are two Dionysos-mask cups among the fifty-two Attic black- figured vases at the Hearst San Simeon State Historical Monument (pls. 1-4).¹ They belong to the Krokotos Group of kylikes and, in the quality of their drawing and the studied balance of their decoration, are among the finest members of this group. One of the San Simeon cups, inv. 5556 (pls. 3-4), has previously been published;² the other, inv. 5511 (pls. 1-2), is presented here for the first time.

DESCRIPTION

Our two cups with masks of Dionysos have essentially the same shape and syntax. They are cups of type A, decorated on the inside with a gorgoneion in a reserved tondo and on the outside with Dionysos masks between large outline eyes and, at the handles, grapevines. One cup, inv. 5511 (pls. 1-2), is slightly smaller than the other, more compact in shape, and somewhat less elaborate in decoration. Its date should be shortly after 530.

This kylix has a broad, deep bowl; a black moulding between the bowl and stem with a white band above it; a short, thick stem; and a foot in two degrees.³ The interior of the bowl is glazed black, except for a reserved central medallion containing a gorgoneion whose face, save for the nose, and ears are drawn in outline. The nose is black, marked with incised lines and one band of red. The ears are drawn in side view, with the helix and lobe indicated. Teeth and tusks are white, and between the upper and lower rows of teeth runs an incised line. The hair consists of alternately black and red locks, separated by incision; the red paint, like the red of the tongue, is laid on over black.

On each side of the exterior of the cup, there is a large mask of Dionysos, drawn partly in outline, between eyes with reserved sclera and irises composed of red, white and black rings. The eyes extend from the mask to the handle-roots, allowing no space for figural or vegetal motifs beside the handles. The masks of Dionysos, drawn in a rather stiff manner, are distinguished from each other by their expressions, one cheerful and one grave. The wine god has a long, full beard, outlined with red paint along its upper edge; a drooping moustache; and hair arranged in a row of tight curls across the brow and two wavy locks on either side of the face. His eyebrows and nose are drawn separately with the nostrils of the nose indicated. Notice the very awkward rendering of the nose, particularly of the serious mask. The ears are extremely small and summary. On his head the god wears an ivy wreath of red and black leaves. A wavy line, perhaps intended as the core of the wreath, separates the leaves and hair curls. At the handles vines bearing bunches of incised grapes spring from two entwined stalks. The patternwork beneath the pictures comprises black lines in the sequence 2-1-2 and rays alternately black and void.

We turn now to the other cup with masks of Dionysos at San Simeon, inv. 5556 (pls. 3-4). Somewhat larger in size than its companion, this kylix has a broad, gently curved bowl; a red moulding, surmounted by a reserved band, at the top of the stem; and a foot in two degrees.⁴ The date should be ca. 525-520. Within the black-glazed interior is a small (d. 0.06 m.), reserved central medallion containing a gorgoneion similar in type to the one on inv. 5511 (pl. 1:1), except for the ears which are empty outlines, the almond-shaped eyes, and the beard shaped like a crescent moon. In addition this gorgoneion has a glaze dot on the forehead and an incised line down the center of the tongue.

The exterior of the bowl displays on each side a large mask of Dionysos between outline eyes, their irises treated as on the other cup. Because the decorative eyes are smaller than those on inv. 5511, there is sufficient space for grapevines beside the handles. The features and ears of the Dionysos mask are rendered in outline, the hair, beard, moustache, and wreath in black-figure. The wine god wears his hair in a sharply peaked row of curls over the forehead and bundles of three wavy locks, bound with thick red fillets, on either side of his face. He has a thick black beard, which is squared off at the bottom, and a thin, drooping moustache, painted red in one instance.⁵ A thick red line defines the upper edge of the beard. The god’s eyebrows and nose form a continuous line, and his ears have curved inner markings and lobes of double form. He wears an ivy wreath, composed of black and red leaves attached to a wavy core by delicate stems. Slender, curling branches frame his face. Between the decorative eyes and the handles grow thick, tangled vines bearing bunches of grapes. A siren to right, her head turned round, stands beneath each handle, replacing the more usual twisted vine stalks. A broad black band, framed by glaze lines, separates the picture frieze from the alternately black and reserved rays at the base of the bowl.

SHAPE AND WORKSHOP ASSOCIATIONS

The two Dionysos-mask cups at San Simeon belong to the Group of Walters 48.42, a fairly large group of eye-cups with primarily Dionysiac scenes, which were put together by Beazley as part of the Krokotos Group.⁶ Mrs. Ure has shown that these kylikes issue from a single workshop, the Krokotos workshop, which also produced the skyphoi of the Heron Class.⁷ The name of this establishment was derived from the saffron-yellow chiton, the krokotos, worn by the women on many of the skyphoi.⁸

The shape typical of the Krokotos Group of cups is represented by Munich 2050, which Bloesch in Formen attischer Schalen placed within the Circle of the Andokides Group.⁹ Of the ten kylikes in this class, six either belong or are related to the Krokotos Group.¹⁰ Besides their shape and syntax the Krokotos cups share in common a black moulding between the bowl and stem with a thin reserved band beneath it (see pl. 1:2).

San Simeon 5511 (pls. 1-2) is similar in shape and size to the cups of Bloesch’s Circle of the Andokides Group. It is closely comparable, for example, to his no. 7, Munich 2052 (pl. 5), also a member of the Krokotos Group, particularly in the height of the stem, which varies among the members of this class.¹¹ Within the Group of Walters 48.42, the nearest morphological parallel to our cup is offered by a kylix in the Seattle Art Museum (pl. 6), a work of the Painter of Munich 2050.¹²

San Simeon 5556 (pls. 3-4) displays the same general shape as most of the Krokotos cups; however, it differs from them in its proportions. The bowl is wider and shallower than those of the other cups; the handles are more slender and form a less acute angle with the rim; and the foot has a taller, more subtly curved stem and a thinner resting-plate. One finds the nearest parallels to these features among bilingual cups made in the Nicosthenic workshop, such as Adolphseck 30.¹³ A black-figured eye-cup in the Vatican, signed by Pamphaios as potter, is also similar in shape to the San Simeon kylix, especially in the form of the foot.¹⁴ Like our cup it has a broad glaze band between the picture zone and the rays, a feature not normally found on cups of the Krokotos Group. Further associations between San Simeon 5556 and the works of Nikosthenes and Pamphaios are evident in the red molding between the bowl and stem and, as will be shown (infra p. 7), in the gorgoneion.¹⁵ These relationships suggests that the cup in San Simeon was made either in the Krokotos workshop by a potter influenced by the Nicosthenic or in the workshop of Nikosthenes itself. From the style of the drawing, however, it was decorated by an artist trained in the Krokotos workshop.

STYLE

Stylistically both Dionysos-mask cups at San Simeon belong to the Krokotos Group and more narrowly to the Group of Walters 48.42, whose name-vase (pl. 7) also carries masks of Dionysos between eyes.¹⁶ The Krokotos Group of kylikes has been studied in detail by both Beazley and Mrs. Ure. In classifying their examples these scholars have used somewhat different terminology, which it may be helpful to define before taking up the subject of the relationship between the San Simeon cups and the Krokotos Group. For Beazley the term Krokotos Group signified the Group of Walters 48.42, the Durand Painter, and the Painter of Munich 2100.¹⁷ Ure has divided the cups of the Krokotos workshop into four groups: (1) the Krokotos Group of cups and (2) the Winchester Group, which are approximately equal to Beazley’s Group of Walters 48.42, (3) the works of an artist whom she calls the Painter of the British Museum Poseidon (in part Beazley’s Painter of Munich 2100), and (4) the Durand Painter.¹⁸

Within the group of Walters 48.42 there are six previously assigned kylikes decorated with masks of Dionysos which are closely similar in style and type to the San Simeon cups. Beazley had attributed one of them, Vatican 458, to the Painter of Munich 2050.¹⁹ Two others, Louvre F 131 and a cup in a Swiss private collection, works of a single hand, may also be by this artist.²⁰ The mask cup Boston 01.8057 (pl. 10:1) was attributed by Ure to the Krokotos Painter, primarily on the evidence of the gorgoneion and the vines.²¹ She has placed the name-vase of the group, Baltimore, Walters 48.42 (pl. 7), within her Winchester Group, which comprises five cups which she believes are by one hand.²² The remaining mask cup, Providence 63.48 (pl. 8) is unattributed.²³

To these six kylikes we may add San Simeon 5511 (pls. 1-2) and 5556 (pls. 3-4). Beazley associated the latter with the Group of Walters 48.42 on the strength of the style of the Dionysos masks but hesitated to include it because he was unfamiliar with the gorgoneion.²⁴ The connection between the former cup and this group has not previously been drawn.

San Simeon 5511 is typical of the Group of Walters 48.42 except for the treatment of the nose of the Dionysos mask and the vines at the handles, which trail downward without crossing one another (contrast pl. 2:1 to pls. 5:4 and 7:3). The artist’s rather stiff manner of drawing may explain the peculiar rendering of these elements. The gorgoneion of our kylix, framed by a dilute glaze line and a reserved circle, corresponds to those of the five cups that make up Ure’s Winchester Group (cf. pls. 5:2 and 7:1).²⁵ These gorgoneia are distinguished from the others of the Krokotos Group chiefly by the inner markings of the ears and the locks of hair behind them. Like the gorgon face of Munich 2052 (pl. 5:2), ours has an incised line between the teeth.²⁶ This detail also appears on the gorgoneion of Providence 63.48 (pl. 8:1), which stands nearest in style and type of all the Walters mask cups to San Simeon 5511.²⁷

The Dionysos masks of our kylix find their closest analogies on the cups in Baltimore and Providence (pls. 7:2 and 8:2-3).²⁸ Only in the rendering of the nose do our masks differ significantly from those on the other cups: it is drawn separated from the eyebrows, rather than in a continuous line with them, and has the nostrils indicated. A parallel to this representation of the nose occurs on the mask of a satyr on the neckamphora Munich N.I. 8518 by the Long-nose Painter (pl. 11:1).²⁹ The Dionysos masks on the Baltimore kylix are framed within branches, which echo the shape of the head, while on the cups in San Simeon and Providence they are placed against a bare background, lending them an austere effect. In other respects too the latter cups belong together: the Dionysos masks on each side differ in expression, one looking jolly, the other grave; the vines at the handles coincide in the forms of the leaves and grapes and in the five twists of the central stalks; and these vines spring from the handles rather than from the stalks, a feature shared with the kylikes of the Winchester Group (cf. pls. 5:4 and 7:3). Despite their many similarities San Simeon 5511 and Providence 63.48 are works of different hands. Both cups appear to belong to Ure’s Winchester Group by virtue of the treatment of the gorgoneia and the vines beneath the handles, but they are not by the artist, or artists, responsible for the other five cups in this group.

The individual character of the handle motif is much more salient on the other Krokotos cup at San Simeon, inv. 5556 (pls. 3-4, particularly pl. 4:1). Here a siren replaces the twisted vine stalks, while the grapevines, which appear to grow from the handle, form delicate, interlaced patterns. The clusters of grapes, treated as silhouettes, hang from short stems.

The same handle decoration, though with the fruit incised, appears on the kylix Copenhagen inv. Chr. VIII 457 (pl. 9), which, as Beazley saw, is by the same hand as the cup in San Simeon.³⁰ On the obverse of this striking piece is represented the return of Hephaistos, with the smith god mounted on a spirited donkey and attended by Dionysos. Allusions to the source of Hephaistos’ inebriation are plentiful in the capacious rhyton held by Dionysos and the tangle of grapevines in the field. The reverse shows two goats rearing antithetically against a tree, and the tondo is decorated with a running woman, probably a maenad to complement the exterior motifs. Although their different subject matter tends to discourage stylistic comparison, the cups in San Simeon and Copenhagen offer close analogies in their subsidiary ornament, such as the sirens at the handles, the vines and branches, and the patternwork beneath the figures. Further similarities occur in the rendering of the ears of the Dionysos masks and those of the figure of Dionysos, the beards, and the individual grape leaves and bunches of fruit.

From the same hand as San Simeon 5556 and Copenhagen Chr. VIII 457 comes a third kylix, now in a Swiss private collection, which Beazley describes as being in the same style as the cup in Copenhagen.³¹ A more ambitious work than its companions, the kylix in Switzerland is decorated on the interior with courting male figures in a tondo, around which frolic satyrs and maenads with Dionysos and Ariadne in their midst. Both sides of the cup’s exterior show the wine god and his consort standing between ornamental eyes, and beyond each eye a figure of Dionysos dancing. Beneath the handles are leaping dolphins. This cup differs in patternwork from the other two, for the rays at the base of the bowl and the sirens and vines at the handles have been omitted.

If we had only the cups in Switzerland and San Simeon with which to work, we should be hard put to determine whether the two vases were by the same artist, since they lack comparable motifs. Fortunately our task is simplified by the kylix in Copenhagen (pl. 9), which offers many points of comparison to the cup in the Swiss private collection. For example, the figures of Dionysos in motion on both pieces are closely

similar, as are Dionysos on his donkey and the satyrs on theirs. On all three cups the form of the branches and their arrangement around the figures and masks are strikingly similar. These comparisons confirm Beazley’s attribution of the cup in the Swiss private collection to the same hand as the one in Copenhagen, which he in turn connected with the piece in San Simeon. In choosing a name for the painter of these cups, who was one of the most talented and individual artists of the Krokotos Group, we have tried to convey something of his distinctive qualities. Thus it seems fitting that he be called the Mask and Siren Painter after the splendid masks of Dionysos on San Simeon 5556 and the sirens, novel substitutes for vine stalks, on both this cup and the one in Copenhagen.

Our new painter’s kylix in San Simeon may be assigned to the Group of Walters 48.42 on the basis of the style of the gorgoneion and the masks of Dionysos, although the vines at the handles differ from the more severe vines of the Walters group.³² The cups in Copenhagen and Switzerland, however, should be kept apart from the Group of Walters 48.42 because they lack both the characteristic gorgoneion and the simple vines with entwined central stalks. All three cups by the Mask and Siren Painter do belong to the Krokotos Group, which is more broadly defined in terms of iconography than the Group of Walters 48.42.

The masks of Dionysos on San Simeon 5556 (pls. 3:2 and 4:2) stand nearest in style to those on the name-vase of the Group of Walters 48.42 (pl. 7:2), although they are not by the same hand.³³ A connection with the Dionysos masks on the richly decorated kylix Boston 01.8057 (pl. 10:1) is evident in the sharply peaked forehead, the double-lobed ears, the three hair locks on either side of the face, and the branches framing the mask. The treatment of the side locks distinguishes the San Simeon masks from the others of the Krokotos Group; each bundle of hair stands out prominently from the face, secured by a thick red fillet.

The gorgoneion of San Simeon 5556 (pl. 3:1) conforms to the same general type as those of the other kylikes of the Group of Walters 48.42.³⁴ In the rendering of the eyebrows, nose, ears, and hair and in the form of the mouth, it especially resembles the gorgoneia on two cups in Munich by the Painter of Munich 2100.³⁵ Unusual for gorgoneia of the Walters type are the almond-shaped eyes, the cleft tongue, and the glaze dot on the forehead, all of which find ready parallels on gorgoneia associated with the workshop of Nikosthenes.³⁶ These details of the gorgoneion, together with certain elements of the shape of our cup (see supra p. 4), point to a connection with the Nicosthenic workshop.

The placement of San Simeon 5511 and 5556 within the Group of Walters 48.42 raises to eight the number of its cups decorated with masks of Dionysos. A newly published kylix with the same motif in the Faina Collection, Orvieto, probably constitutes the ninth.³⁷ Only the loss of a substantial portion of the gorgoneion prevents this cup from being assigned to the group. Most of the hair, beard, and tongue and all of the right ear of the creature have been preserved, revealing that it was close in style to the gorgoneion of San Simeon 5511 (pl. 1:1). Like the gorgon face on San Simeon 5556 (pl. 3:1), the Orvieto example has an incised line down the center of the tongue. The Dionysos masks, which lack the framing branches of the more elaborate examples, resemble those on the kylix in Providence (pl. 8:2-3). Other masks of Dionysos in the Krokotos style appear on a cup fragment in Parma and a Chalcidizing cup in Munich (pl. 10:2-4), the gorgoneion of which departs from the Krokotos type.³⁸

DIONYSOS-MASK CUPS NOT OF THE KROKOTOS GROUP

Most of the extant Attic eye-cups which feature masks of Dionysos are associated with the Group of Walters 48.42. We know of only five exceptions, all probably contemporary with the Krokotos cups and icono- graphically indebted to them. One of these pieces, a Chalcidizing cup, appeared recently in the Basel market; another, whose whereabouts we have been unable to trace, was offered for sale by Sotheby & Co., London, in 1969.³⁹ The remaining vases are kylikes in Birmingham and Altenburg and fragments of a red-figured cup in Florence.⁴⁰

Related in motif, though not in style, to the Krokotos and the other eye-cups with masks of Dionysos are contemporaneous kylikes which display gorgoneia or masks of a satyr between eyes. Examples of the latter theme decorate a kylix in the Louvre, assigned by Beazley to the manner of the Lysippides Painter, and one recently acquired by the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, which Boardman has attributed to the same hand as that of the other cup, an artist whom he calls the Bomford Painter.⁴¹

OTHER SHAPES WITH MASKS OF DIONYSOS

The motif of a mask of Dionysos or a satyr between eyes is not confined to kylikes; it also appears on a few black-figured neck-amphorae and column- kraters, which seem to be iconographically indebted to the cups.⁴² Among neck-amphorae, the mask motif is characteristic of a class some of whose members are associated with the Antimenes Painter.⁴³ An example is the amphora Munich N.I. 8518 (pl. 11), decorated by the Long-nose Painter with a satyr mask on one side and a figure of Dionysos on the other.⁴⁴ The neck-amphorae with masks are contemporary with the Dionysos-mask cups of the Group of Walters 48.42, which may be dated ca. 530-520 or slightly later. It is thus tempting to conclude that some of these vases with matching motifs were commissioned as sets for special symposia.

From the years ca. 515-510 come two column-kraters decorated with masks of Dionysos which, judging from their similarity in shape, size and patternwork, were probably made in a single workshop. One of them is a handsome piece in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (pl. 12), displaying a mask of Dionysos on the obverse and a satyr mask on the reverse, both framed by eyes with white sclera.⁴⁵ On the other krater, which recently appeared in the Basel market, is represented a mask of Dionysos between eyes with black sclera; the opposite side shows, between similar eyes, Dionysos seated with a satyr.⁴⁶ Neither vase is by the same hand as any of the eye-cups or neck-amphorae decorated with masks, although there is a certain resemblance, probably more typological than stylistic, between the Dionysos mask on the New York krater (pl. 12:1) and those on the Krokotos cups in the Louvre and a Swiss private collection.⁴⁷

THE ORIGIN OF THE DIONYSOS-MASK MOTIF

The motif of a frontal mask of Dionysos between eyes may have developed naturally from the simple design of a nose between eyes seen on early eyecups, such as Munich 2044 by Exekias.⁴⁸ It seems more probable, however, that the motif found its source in a ready-made model, either a theatrical mask of Dionysos or the mask-idols of the god worshipped at an Attic festival which some regard as the Lenaia, others as the Anthesteria. Our knowledge of these idols comes solely from the series of so-called Lenaian vases, which date from ca. 500 to ca. 420.

One of the principal arguments in favor of the theatrical mask as the model for the Dionysos-mask motif is based on the fact that the beginning of drama in Athens falls within the period in which the kylikes and neckamphorae with masks of Dionysos were made. It is known that tragedy was introduced in Athens during the third quarter of the sixth century, the official date being 534.⁴⁹ Although we have no undisputed archaeological evidence for the existence of tragic masks before the second quarter of the fifth century, when they are represented in the hands of actors on two red-figured vases,⁵⁰ there is a tradition that Thespis, who was active sometime after the middle of the sixth century, introduced painted linen masks into dramatic performances.⁵¹ It is certainly possible that these masks, the subjects of which were often drawn from the realm of Dionysos, inspired the vase-painters to represent masks in the narrow space between the eyes on the type-A cup. Particularly relevant to this proposal is the fact that the kylikes and neck-amphorae with masks began to be made during the last years of the rule of Peisistratos, who was renowned for his patronage of Dionysiac festivals and his introduction of competitions for tragic choruses.⁵² Perhaps some of the vases which display masks of Dionysos or a satyr were commissioned by patrons or members of the choruses to celebrate winning performances.⁵³

The third and, we believe, more probable explanation for the origin of the Dionysos masks on the black-figured eye-cups, neck-amphorae and column-kraters derives them from the mask-idols of Dionysos which were worshipped in a ceremony pictured on the later Lenaian vases. These are a series of black- and red-figured vases, the earlier ones mainly lekythoi and oinochoai, the later for the most part stamnoi, which depict a ritual conducted by women or maenads around an image of Dionysos.⁵⁴ On two late black-figured lekythoi, which apparently show the same ceremony, the object of worship is a satyr mask.⁵⁵ Although the identity of the festival at which this ritual took place