The Despinis Head is part of a colossal ancient Greek sculpture, depicting a female head, which was conserved in the store rooms of the Archaeological Museum of the Ancient Agora in Athens until recently. According to George Despinis, director of the museum, it was originally part of the statue of Artemis Brauronia carved by Praxiteles.
Conserved in the storerooms of the Museum of the Athenian agora under the inventory number 1352, the Despinis Head was originally published as a male head with an erroneous provenance. [1] It was claimed that the head derived from the Makriyannis area just below the Acropolis. Using the original records mentioning it and a photograph, George Despinis established that is actually derived from the sanctuary of Athena Hygieia between the Brauroneion and the Propylaea. It was probably discovered in the course of Kyriakos S. Pittakis' excavations of 1839. The remnants of an earring prove that the head is female. [2]
The head, carved in Parian marble, measures 56 cm high (i.e. twice life size) and the complete statue would have had a height of around 3.6 metres, [3] which suggests that it was a cult statue. [4] It has been damaged by the passage of time, but also by iconoclastic Christians who destroyed the left side of her hairdo, her nose, mouth, have been broken off and her eyes have been smashed.
The face of the goddess is rounded and slightly asymmetrical, with a rather severe expression. Her hairdo, which is parted in the middle of her forehead, is made up of two thick plaits wrapped around the head and a small vertical plait running from the front of her head to the top. This hairdo is most common in depictions of children and young women, such as a statue of Artemis found at Delos, and therefore fits a depiction of the young, virgin goddess Artemis. [3]
In his description of Attica, Pausanias mentions the sanctuary of Artemis Brauronia and says "the cult statue is the work of Praxiteles. [5] Traditionally the Diana of Gabii or the Artemis of Dresden have been considered to be imitations of this work.
George Despinis instead proposed that this head was Praxiteles' statue, since it was discovered around the location visited by Pausanias. He compared it with the Dancers of Delphi and the Themis of Rhamnous, two works which are dated to 330-320 BC and 320-280 BC respectively and belong to the final phase of Praxiteles' career.
It has been argued that the arrangement of the Brauronion, partially reconstructed from the archaeological remains, did not support the existence of a cult statue. [6] However, the main objection to the attribution of the Despinis Head as Praxiteles' Artemis is stylistic: the solemn expression of the Despinis Head has little of the charm and grace considered to be characteristic of Praxiteles' style. However this characterisation of Praxiteles is largely derived from the Hermes and the Infant Dionysus whose attribution to Praxiteles is itself highly controversial. Moreover, the heavily damaged state of the head must be kept in mind, as well as the fact that it is difficult to imagine the impression that it would have had on a viewer in its original location, three metres above ground level.
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In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Artemis is the goddess of the hunt, the wilderness, wild animals, nature, vegetation, childbirth, care of children, and chastity. In later times, she was identified with Selene, the personification of the Moon. She was often said to roam the forests and mountains, attended by her entourage of nymphs. The goddess Diana is her Roman equivalent.
Praxiteles of Athens, the son of Cephisodotus the Elder, was the most renowned of the Attica sculptors of the 4th century BC. He was the first to sculpt the nude female form in a life-size statue. While no indubitably attributable sculpture by Praxiteles is extant, numerous copies of his works have survived; several authors, including Pliny the Elder, wrote of his works; and coins engraved with silhouettes of his various famous statuary types from the period still exist.
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A xoanon was a wooden cult image of Archaic Greece. Classical Greeks associated such cult objects, whether aniconic or effigy, with the legendary Daedalus. Many such cult images were preserved into historical times, though none are known to have survived to the modern day, except as copies in stone or marble. In the 2nd century CE, Pausanias described numerous xoana in his Description of Greece, notably the image of Hera in her temple at Samos. "The statue of the Samian Hera, as Aethilos [sic] says, was a wooden beam at first, but afterwards, when Prokles was ruler, it was humanized in form". In Pausanias' travels he never mentions seeing a xoanon of a "mortal man".
Lycosura was a city in the ancient Parrhasia region of south Arcadia said by Pausanias to be the oldest city in the world, although there is no evidence for its existence before the fourth century BCE. Its current significance is chiefly associated with the sanctuary of the goddess Despoina, which contained a colossal sculptural group that Pausanias wrote was made by Damophon of Messene. This group comprises acrolithic-technique statues of Despoina and Demeter seated on a throne, with statues of Artemis and the Titan Anytos standing on either side of them – all in Pentelic marble. The dates of both the temple and the sculptural group have occasioned some dispute. Remains of a stoa, altars, and other structures have been found at the site as well. The Sanctuary of Despoina at Lycosoura is located 9 km WSW of Megalopolis, 6.9 km SSE of Mount Lykaion, and 160 km SW of Athens. There is a small museum at the archaeological site housing small finds as well as part of the cult group, while the remains of the cult statues of Despoina and Demeter are displayed at the National Archaeological Museum of Athens.
The Lemnian Athena, or Athena Lemnia, was a classical Greek statue of the goddess Athena. According to geographer Pausanias (1.28.2), the original bronze cast was created by the sculptor Phidias circa 450–440 BCE, for Athenians living on the island of Lemnos to dedicate on the Acropolis of Athens.
The Ares Borghese is a Roman marble statue of the imperial era. It is 2.11 metres high. It is identifiable as Ares by the helmet and by the ankle ring given to him by his lover Aphrodite. This statue possibly preserves some features of an original work in bronze, now lost, of the 5th century BC.
The Brauroneion was the sanctuary of Artemis Brauronia on the Athenian Acropolis, located in the southwest corner of the Acropolis plateau, between the Chalkotheke and the Propylaea in Greece. It was originally dedicated during the reign of Peisistratos. Artemis Brauronia, protector of women in pregnancy and childbirth, had her main sanctuary at Brauron, a demos on the east coast of Attica.
In Greek mythology and ancient religion, Nike is the goddess who personifies victory in any field including art, music, war, and athletics. She is often portrayed in Greek art as Winged Victory in the motion of flight; however, she can also appear without wings as "Wingless Victory" when she is being portrayed as an attribute of another deity such as Athena.
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Hermes and the Infant Dionysus, also known as the Hermes of Praxiteles or the Hermes of Olympia is an ancient Greek sculpture of Hermes and the infant Dionysus discovered in 1877 in the ruins of the Temple of Hera, Olympia, in Greece. It is displayed at the Archaeological Museum of Olympia.
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