115. 99.538 AMPHORA PLATE LXV, 1-2 and PLATE LXVII
Height 0.5325, diameter 0.3465. Formerly in the possession of the Roman dealer Basseggio; later in the Joly de Bammeville collection (Sale Cat. Christie May 13 1854 no. 40), then in the Forman collection (sale Sotheby 19 June 1899 no. 305). Cecil Smith The Forman Collection pll. 5-6, whence Pfuhl figs. 316 and 266, Seltman Attic Vase-painting pl. 10, (A) VA. p. 4, (A) Herford A Handbook of Greek Vase Painting, frontispiece, (A) Stella p. 785; Fairbanks Greek Gods and Heroes 3 (1927) p. 59 fig. 51; A, Fairbanks and Chase p. 56 fig. 58; Chase Guide p. 52 fig. 62; Dev. pll. 34-35, whence Frel R.V. figs. 138-9; the shape, Caskey G. p. 60. About 520 B.C.: A by the Andokides Painter (Cecil Smith The Forman Collection p. 55; VA. p. 3 no. 2; Att. V. p. 8 no. 5; ARV.1 p. 2 no. 10, ARV.2 p. 4 no. 12), B by the Lysippides Painter (ABV. p. 255 no. 6). The first reference to the vase is in Bullettino 1842 p. 187: it was then in Basseggio's possession and had been shown by Emil Braun at a meeting of the Archaeological Institute in Rome. Many of Basseggio's vases were found at Vulci. The amphora is of Type A (see iii p. 1; Boston 01.8037). It is a little shorter than no. 114, and less slender; the mouth is broader and more flaring, the handles wider open, the foot broader, with the lower member projecting farther beyond the upper. The upper member of the foot is again black. There is a red line outside, on the upper edge of the mouth; on the lower edge; on the neck; above the upper picture-border; above the rays; and a pair below the lower border of the picture. There are no red lines on the foot; the base-fillet is black not red, and the backs of the handle-flanges are black. There are no handle-palmettes; and no graffito. Of all the bilingual amphorae, this is that in which the two designs are most alike. There is very little difference even in detail. Herakles drives a bull to sacrifice, past a tree, holding his club in his right hand, and in his left the rope fastened round the horns of the bull, also a bundle of spits. He wears a chitoniskos, a lionskin, a belt, has sword and quiver slung, by crossbands, at his left flank, carries two small wineskins, apparently empty, over his left arm. The bull's head is filleted, and the woollen fillet has the form commonly used for this purpose as for others, tied at intervals and the ends splayed. In the black-figure picture, the bow appears at the side as well as the quiver, and only the chape of the scabbard is seen. The chiton has fully three-dimensional folds, and every other fold is washed with red. The left calf of Herakles is missing. and part of his right foot, a little of the tree, part of the bull's right fore-hoof and of its neck with a stretch of the fillet. The contours are incised. Red for the beard of Herakles, his belt, parts of the quiver, the tufts of the mane, the hither wineskin, the bull's testicles and fillet, alternate lines on its neck, the edgeing of the incised lines representing the ribs and of one incised line on the hind-quarters. White for the crossbands and the lion's teeth. In the red-figure picture, a fracture has removed the lower lip and the tip of the nose; another, part of the left elbow; a third passes through the toes of the right foot. The left foot is missing, with the right hind-hoof of the bull. The movement is somewhat freer than in the other picture. The chitoniskos has the same 'black-figure' patterns as the cloak of Ajax on no. 114 (iii p. 6; Boston 01.8037). The hilt is dotted; for the shape compare the amphora in the Faina collection; for the lionskin, tree, club, the Louvre amphora Louvre F 204; for the club, London B 193. The greater part of the human figure has relief-contour; but not the face, the front of the lionskin, the left hand, the knees, the toes, the knots of the club, the crosspiece of the hilt, the arrows, the cover of the quiver. Parts of the bull are contoured with relief-lines. The contour-band appears at the knees of Herakles and at the cover of the quiver: but nowhere else. The tree has relief-contour. Within the figure of Herakles, brown is used for the markings on the knees, for the fingers and toes, the right wrist, the elbows, the hooks at the ends of the lines on the thighs and on the left forearm, the lower side of the right ankle-bone, the arrows, the lion's eye and the detail of its head, the binding of the wineskins, the pair of lines at the base of the bull's horn. The baldrick is brown. Red for the lion's jowl (with incised strokes), the off wineskin, the horizontal lines on the quiver, the rope, the bull's fillet, the leaves. The beard and hair of Herakles are in raised black dots on a black ground. In the double-floral band above the picture there are red details as well as incised, whereas in the band above the black-figure picture there are incised details only. Furtwängler was the first to recognize the subject of the Boston vase,1 and Hauser to identify the object in the left hand of Herakles as a bundle of spits secured by slides.2 Such bundles are seen elsewhere, for instance in the pictures of Herakles and Busiris by the Troilos Painter on his hydria in Munich and the Pan Painter on his pelike in Athens.3 Furtwängler thought of the last sacrifice on Mount Kenaion: but it is doubtful whether the painter can have had that in mind. Herakles sacrificed bulls on many occasions: for instance to Chryse, or after raiding the cattle of Geryon.4 On a black-figured lekythos by the Sappho Painter in New York he has already sacrificed and now, in presence of Helios, is roasting the meat on spits over the altar;5 on a red-figured cup by the Epidromos Painter in Berlin he pours the libation on the altar with a prayer, while a satyr, as acolyte, roasts the meat.6 The only other vase with the same subject as ours is a black-figured neck-amphora, of the Leagros Group, in Berlin, where altar and temple are also indicated.7 On two smaller black-figured vases, Herakles seems to be tying a fillet round a bull's neck preparatory to sacrificing it: an oinochoe in Rhodes, and an olpe, from Halai, in Thebes.8 This is a riper and better work than no. 114, and the flabbiness of the painter's early figures has gone.Norton 1896, pp. 38-39; Walston 1926, p. 35; E. F. Prins de Jong, E. C. Rÿken-Fontein, BABesch 21 (1946), p. 17; Stella 1956, p. 785, illus.; C. Vermeule and D. von Bothmer, AJA 60 (1956), p. 341; Brommer 1956, p. 121, nos. A 1 and B 1; Levi & Stenico 1956, pp. 34 (fig. 37), 36; Encyclopedia of World Art 2, 1960, New York, McGraw-Hill, pl. 37 (upper right); Schauenburg 1961, pp. 55 (note 18), 66 (note 38), 67-68, 70; Palmer 1962, pp. 74-75, fig. 61; M. Robertson, AJA 66 (1962), p. 312; Carpenter 1962, p. 89, fig. 22; P. Amandry, AM 77 (1962), p. 40; H. Marwitz, ÖJh 46 (1961-1963) (Hauptblatt), pp. 82, 96 (figs. 59-60), 102; Chase & Vermeule 1963, pp. 57-58, 83-84, fig. 75; A. W. Byvanck, BABesch 38 (1963), p. 86; Noble 1965, p. 52, figs. 200-201; Knauer 1965, p. 9, figs. 13-14; J. G. Szilágyi, Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts 28 (1966), pp. 19 (note 11, no. 12), 20, 25 (note 38), 28-29; Schefold 1967a, p. 221, pl. 197; U. Kron, JdI 86 (1971), pp. 140-141, fig. 11; Para., pp. 113 (no. 6), 321 (no. 12); M. B. Moore, AJA 76 (1972), p. 3, note 11; Brilliant 1973, p. 133, fig. 5-6; Brommer 1973, p. 205, nos. A3 and B1; Boardman 1974, pp. 105, 118 (fig. 164), 225; Samos, XI, p. 131, under no. 64 A/B (Freyer-Schauenburg 1974); Mommsen 1975, pp. 78 (note 379), 121; M. Robertson 1975, pp. 134, 216, pl. 71a-b; Boardman 1975, pp. 15-17, 23 (fig. 8), 208, 215, 242; Folsom 1976, pp. 36-37, pls. 2-3; C. De Palma, ArchCl 29 (1977), p. 55; Schefold 1978, pp. 103-104 (fig. 129), 281, 310; Schmaltz 1980, pp. 107 (note 145), 120 (note 205); M. Robertson 1981, pp. 60-64, figs. 86-87; Beazley Addenda 1, pp. 32-33 (ref. to Cohen, Attic Bilingual Vases, pl. 35, 1-2), 71; Images 1984, p. 53, fig. 81 (J.-L. Durand, A. Schnapp); Bilderwelt 1984, pp. 80-81, fig. 81 (J.-L. Durand and A. Schnapp); M. J. Vickers, JHS 105 (1985), p. 118, pl. 5 a-b; S. Woodford, 1986, An Introduction to Greek Art, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, p. 57, figs. 74-75; Beazley 1986, p. 71, pl. 80, 1; T. S. Kawami, AJA 90 (1986), p. 264; LIMC, IV, 1, p. 799, no. 1332, IV, 2, pl. 531, illus. (J. Boardman); Beazley 1989, pp. 18-19; Beazley Addenda 2, pp. 66, 150; Frank 1990, p. 44; J. Chamay, Schweizer Münzblätter 40 (1990), p. 35.