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72.
Athens honours Sotimos of Herakleia
IG I3 74 Athens, EM 6609 ca. 410 Plate 38

Found on Akropolis in 1835. Both edges preserved, back rough-picked. Original thickness preserved on right side only. Relief slightly wider than inscription and separated from it by plain taenia and ovolo. Surface slightly weathered, battered at extreme left. White, medium-grained marble. p.h. 0.395, p.h. of relief 0.16, w. 0.415 (top), 0.38 (bottom), th. 0.102 (top), 0.085 (bottom), relief h. 0.015, h. of letters 0.017 (lines 1-3), 0.01 (lines 4 ff.).

The decree is a grant of proxeny to an otherwise unknown Sotimos of Herakleia and his descendants. The generally accepted date for the decree of 424 /23 depends upon the restoration of the name Neokleides as secretary (lines 5-6) and the association of this man with the Neokleides who appears as secretary in other decrees of this year (IG J3 36 and 75). On that basis, West argued that the Herakleia in question was the wealthy Pontic city that only months before had become a tributary member of the empire and that Sotimos might have been honoured for assisting a ship-wrecked tribute-collecting squadron under Lamachos in the territory of Herakleia in the summer of 424 (Thuc. 4.75.1-2; Diod. 12.72.4). The style of the relief, however, suggests a later date; the loops and viscous curves of Athena's drapery are characteristic of the drapery of dated reliefs of ca. 410 (nos. 7, 8) and of the Erechtheion frieze (P.N. Boulter, AntP 10 (1970), pl. 1).

The relief depicts Sotimos and his city's eponymous hero Herakles standing before a larger figure of Athena seated on a rock at the left. Her shield is propped up behind her, and she holds her helmet in her right hand. A similar seated Athena also appears on the Methone decrees (no. 2), on a number of other late fifth- and early fourth-century document reliefs (nos. 11, 71, 87, 90, 91) and on the Nike Temple Parapet (Carpenter, pls. XIX, XXIV). Immediately to the right of Athena stands the much smaller Sotimos, of whom only the lower part of the legs and himation are preserved. Further right are the nude lower legs of the slightly larger Herakles. The broad end of his club rests on the ground at his left and part of his lion skin can be seen between the club and his left leg (cf. no. 82). For other possible examples of Herakies as eponymous hero, see nos. 111, 129, 133, 158.

L. Ross, Kunstblatt (1835) no. 27 = Archäologische Aufsätze I (1855) 85; K. S. Pittakys, ArchEph (1840) 348 no. 426, fig. 426 (drwg.); Rangabé I, 345 no. 260, pl. 7 (drwg.) and 345 no. 261; Müller and Schöll, 53 no. 30, 74-76; Schöne, 26-27 no. 52, pl. 9 (drwg.); A. Dumont, Monuments Grecs 1 (1873) 34-35; IG I 65; Dumont, BCH 2 (1878) 563-64, 566; P. Gardner, JHS 9 (1888) 50; Le Bas, pl. 36.2 (drwg.); J. Six, JdI 30 (1915) 88, fig. 9; Walter, Beschreibung, 12, 16, 20; IG I2 145; Binneboeßel, 5 no. 13, 20, 36-37, 46, 48, 52, 73; AB. West, AJP 56 (1935) 72-76; Svoronos, 664 no. 431 (2), pl. 207.2; Süsserott, 102 n. 54, 216; Picard II.2, 838; SEG 10.82; Lambrechts, pl. 3; Guarducci, 593-95; Schmaltz, 23 n. 28; Mitropoulou, Corpus I, 172 no. 8, fig. 82; Walbank, 253-57 no. 46, pl. 26; SEG 28.12; Meyer, 274 A 31, pl. 12.2.

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