Collection: Athens, National Archaeological Museum
Title: Grave monument with seated slave
Context: From Athens
Findspot: Found at Athens, on Odos Stadiou (124 D) (in 1887, according to Karouzou)
Summary: Maidservant seated, with her legs crossed
Object Function: Funerary
Material: Marble
Sculpture Type: Free-standing statue
Category: Single monument
Style: Late Classical
Technique: In-the-round
Original or Copy: Original
Date: ca. 350 BC
Dimensions: H. 0.83 m; Th. 0.77 m
Scale: Under life-size
Region: Attica
Period: Late Classical


Subject Description: A woman, presumably a female servant, sits on the ground, with her legs crossed ahead of her. She wears a belted, short-sleeved chiton or tunic, with shoulder straps. She holds both arms forward, with her left forearm in her lap, and her right arm raised, probably to rest her right hand on her cheek, in a mourning gesture.

Condition: Intact

Condition Description: The head is missing.

Material Description: "Pentelic" (according to Clairmont)

Collection History: The statue was known before 1885, according to Clairmont.

Other Notes: This statue, along with another (a pendant), may have stood in front of a large funerary monument, or grave plot, to serve as an eternal mourner.

Sources Used: Clairmont 1993, 1.9, cat. 7 (ill.); Karouzou 1968, 120

Other Bibliography: Vierneisel-Schlörb 1988, 130 (under no. 1); Vedder 1985, S12, figs. 59-60; Karouzou 1981, 90, pl. 111; S. Karouzou, AM 96 (1981), 199; Frel 1969, no. 340; Collignon 1911, 213, fig. 136