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Fragment of a Greek (Attic) votive relief
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Curatorial note
This fragment comes from the left side of the relief and includes a section of the anta on the left as well as the bottom strip. Within this frame, the body of a female figure standing right, in front of a tree (? behind, left), holding a long torch (the upper end of which is broken off) transversally in her raised left and lowered right hands. She is clad in a long chiton and tightly wrapped himation and wears sandals.
This relief and the costuming treatment, pose, etc. of the figure are nearly exactly as in a votive relief in Athens, Artemis and Adorants.1 The goddess Artemis or more likely Kora2, filling the height of the area within the anta, stands right with a long, flaming torch reaching to the upper right corner under the top anta. From the right three half-size adult (two male and one female) and a smaller child worshippers approach with their right hands raised towards the larger figure of the goddess. For the right side of a companion to the Soane fragment, showing two of these worshippers, see the following (Soane fragment M1149/Vermeule 295).
Artemis had a variety of cults in Attica, from Aulis to the Piraeus, as the similar votive reliefs to the Thracian goddess Artemis Bendis indicate3.
1 J.N. Svoronos, Das Athener National Museum, 4 vols, Athens, 1908 - , I, II, p. 463f., pl. LXXVII, no. 1461; S. Reinach, Répertoire de Reliefs Grecs et Romains, 3 vols, Paris, 1909-12, II, P. 321, no. 2, see also p. 320, no. 3.
2 P. Ardnt and W. Amelung, Photographische Einzelaufnahmen antiker Sculpturen, Munich, 1893-1912, no. 1236.
3 See American Journal of Archaeology 68, 1964, p. 327, pl. 99, fig. 8.
This relief and the costuming treatment, pose, etc. of the figure are nearly exactly as in a votive relief in Athens, Artemis and Adorants.1 The goddess Artemis or more likely Kora2, filling the height of the area within the anta, stands right with a long, flaming torch reaching to the upper right corner under the top anta. From the right three half-size adult (two male and one female) and a smaller child worshippers approach with their right hands raised towards the larger figure of the goddess. For the right side of a companion to the Soane fragment, showing two of these worshippers, see the following (Soane fragment M1149/Vermeule 295).
Artemis had a variety of cults in Attica, from Aulis to the Piraeus, as the similar votive reliefs to the Thracian goddess Artemis Bendis indicate3.
1 J.N. Svoronos, Das Athener National Museum, 4 vols, Athens, 1908 - , I, II, p. 463f., pl. LXXVII, no. 1461; S. Reinach, Répertoire de Reliefs Grecs et Romains, 3 vols, Paris, 1909-12, II, P. 321, no. 2, see also p. 320, no. 3.
2 P. Ardnt and W. Amelung, Photographische Einzelaufnahmen antiker Sculpturen, Munich, 1893-1912, no. 1236.
3 See American Journal of Archaeology 68, 1964, p. 327, pl. 99, fig. 8.
Unrecorded.
Literature
A. Michaelis, Ancient Marbles in Great Britain, trans. C.A.M. Fennell, Cambridge, 1882, p. 476, no. 19.
If you have any further information about this object, please contact us: worksofart@soane.org.uk