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.