Austin
1980.33
Attic Black-Figure Oinochoe
Collection of the Archer M. Huntington Art
Gallery, the University of Texas, Austin, James R. Dougherty, Jr. Foundation
and Archer M. Huntington Museum Fund Purchase (1980.33)
Related to the Class of Vatican G47
520-500 B.C.
Height: 13.9 cm. Herakles wrestling the
Nemean Lion
The first of Herakles' labors was the capture and killing of the lion
which had ravaged the valley around Nemea, in the northeastern Peloponnesos. The
lion's invulnerable pelt rendered all weapons useless and forced the hero to
engage the beast in a wrestling match and finally strangle it. Herakles skinned
the dead animal and thereafter wore the impervious hide for protection, and in
vase-painting it is usually his distinguishing attribute (see for example
New Orleans 16.38).
On this vase, the wrestling match is in full swing and the outcome is
still in doubt. Herakles is entirely nude, but for a fillet around his head and
a baldric worn diagonally around his chest, to support a sword. His bow, quiver,
and sword all rest in the branches of a tree in the background. With his left
hand the hero is grasping the lion's belly, while his right holds off a rear paw
with which the lion tries to claw Herakles' head. He hunches over the lion's
luxuriant mane, leaving his thigh and groin area exposed and dangerously close
to the lion's open jaws. Behind Herakles stands Iolaos, his young nephew and
frequent companion in his labors. He wears a corselet over a short
chiton and holds Herakles' knotty club. His
sword hangs from a baldric, and a second baldric crosses in an X pattern. He
stretches out his left hand over the wrestling pair as a weak gesture of fright,
or of encouragement for the hero.
In early black-figure, before about 540, Herakles and the lion
regularly wrestle standing up. The great master Exekias apparently first showed
them wrestling on the ground, as John Boardman has recently demonstrated, on a
vase, fragments of which are at Ensérune. After that this version became
increasingly popular in the last quarter of the sixth century, the period of the
Austin oinochoe.
This vase is similar in shape to a large class of late sixth century
oinochoai designated by Beazley the Class of Vatican G47. The term 'class'
refers to shape and proportions, not to drawing style.
Bibliography
ABV, 431, 9;
Brommer 1973, 136,40;
CVA, Castle Ashby (Great Britain 15) 13-14
and pl. 22.5-7;
Christie's Sale
Catalogue, lot. 78, p. 119, ill. On Herakles and the Lion:
Brommer 1974, 7-11; for the wrestling
match on the ground and the Ensérune fragments:
Boardman 1978, 14-15.
