NOT HERAKLES, A PTOLEMY

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NOT HERAKLES, A PTOLEMY Author(s): DONALD M. BAILEY Source: Antike Kunst, 33. Jahrg., H. 2. (1990), pp. 107-110Published by: Vereinigung der Freunde Antiker KunstStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41320924Accessed: 11-12-2015 20:55 UTC

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DONALD M. BAILEY

NOT HERAKLES, A PTOLEMY

Amongst the fine and varied collection of ancient bronzes bequeathed to the British Museum by Richard Payne Knight in 1824 is a figure identified as Herakles (Pl.21)1. How Knight came by it and where it was found are unknown2. Some 29,9 cm high, it depicts a nude male, standing contraposto, the weight on the right leg, the left slightly bent. He looks down a little and somewhat to his right. The eyes are well-defined, the nose straight, though possibly worn, and the mouth is small with full lips (Pl.2iy 2). He is beardless, his hair is arranged in short curls and he is crowned with a narrow segmented diadem (PL 21 , 1.3). On the left side is the lion- skin of Herakles, the head resting on the shoulder of the man, the remainder falling down behind; the front legs of the lion-skin are not depicted, and one of the rear legs and the tail are broken and lost. The modeller appears to have misunderstood the draping of the skin, as one edge passes in front of the man's wrist where his clenched fist rests on his hip, and the rest flies behind. Also grossly misunderstood is the left hand itself, which is shown resting comfortably enough on the hip from the front, but behind it is the handle of a weapon, now broken away, but once at an angle quite at variance with the hand in front. Over the right shoulder a baldrick is slung, holding a reel-shaped object under the left arm. The figure holds out, as though towards the spectator, a short and stubby cornucopia, with a knobbed tip. Emerg- ing from the mouth of the horn are fruits, a pyramidal cake, and a bunch of grapes. The surface of the bronze is by no means smooth: corrosion products may have been cleaned off by Knight, and his customary dark surface-

1 Reg. no. GR 1824. 4-46. 13; H.B. Walters, Catalogue of the Bron- zes, Greek, Etruscan, and Roman, in the Department of Greek and Roman Antiquities, British Museum (1899) No. 1247. I would like to thank Martin Price, Catherine Johns and Lucilla Burn for advice and help with this paper. 2 Knight obtained his bronzes from many sources, personally or by agents in Italy (a large number were also acquired from Sir William Hamilton, Ambassador at Naples) and France, a few from further east, and many from London salerooms and dealers: M.Clarke and N. Penny, The Arrogant Connoisseur: Richard Payne Knight 1751-1824 (1982) 68-73.

coloration applied. The left foot is restored in bronze from just above the ankle. Knight, in the calatogue of his bronzes, stated that the figure was 'a very coarse sculpture of the lower Empire', but 'though the execution is rude, the design is good; the figure having been probably copied from some celebrated statue of better times'3; Edward Hawkins (Keeper of the Department of Antiquities, British Museum, 1826-60) said the same, in almost identical words4; H.B. Walters (a later Keeper of the Department) in his turn, describes the figure as 'rudely executed, but probably copied from some celebrated Greek original'5; the pres- ent writer must follow his distinguished predecessors and agree that the figure is indeed based upon a full-scale lost original. How far the maker of the bronze was fam- iliar with the archetype can not be assessed: he may have based his version on other copies, perhaps distributed as souvenirs of the city in which it was set up; the original itself may have been moved from that city, perhaps to Italy, as happened during the Roman period to so many famous or merely decorative works of art. His errors in composition could have several explanations, such as the use of a poor copy, or carelessness if the original was his inspiration. Although hitherto identified as Herakles, the figure has only one of the attributes commonly associated with him, the lion-skin; the weapon held in his left hand, but now broken away, was thought by Knight, Hawkins and Walters to be a club, but the handle remaining is clearly that of a sword (Pl.21, j ), and this would explain the presence of the baldrick (to hold the scabbard, most of which is hidden by the arm and the lion-skin). Of course, a baldrick could support a combined bow-case and qui- ver, as in a wall-painting from Herculaneum6, and the

3 R. Payne Knight, MS Catalogue of Bronzes, folio 1 36, XLVI, 13. 4 E. Hawkins, MS Catalogue of the Bronzes in the British Museum ii, folio 321. 5 Walters op.c. (supra note 1) 213. 6 K. Schefold and F.Jung, Die Urkonige, Perseus, Bellerophon, Her- akles und Theseus in der klassischen und hellenistischen Kunst (1988) 207 fig. 267.

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bow is an attribute of Herakles, but such a large piece of equipment is not possible in our bronze. Again, a sword is not normally thought of as being associated with Her- akles, but he is shown using one in Athenian red-figure vase painting7, and, indeed, is shown on a stamnos with a scabbarded sword depending from a baldrick8. A horn of plenty seems at first sight unlikely for a being with the character of Herakles, but he is certainly shown with it in Hellenistic and Roman art, if not very often9. Depictions in the round or in relief normally represent him holding the cornucopia in the crook of the left arm10, the stan- dard position for such an attribute when held by other deities or personifications (Fortuna, Eros, Harpokrates, etc.): no other examples have been traced where it is held out in his right hand11, a pose Herakles usually keeps for his drinking-cup12. The cornucopia was thought to be the horn of the river-god Acheloos, wrenched off by Her- akles during their fight, and thus an appropriate attribute (another version of the origin of the cornucopia is less relevant to Herakles: that it was the horn of the goat Amaltheia, who suckled the child Zeus). But the face of our figure, although on a small scale and summarily treated, has the appearance of a portrait, idealised perhaps, but not the idealisation of a hero. The diadem

7 e.g., ibid. 156 fig. 193; 192 fig. 233. 8 ibid. 188 fig. 230. 9 Roscher, ML 1, 1 (1884-90)21835.^. Herakles 4c! (A. Furtwangler). In classical Greek art his connection with the cornucopia is mainly secondary, to do with an episode with Palaimon/Melikertes, who has such an attribute: R. Vollkommer, Herakles in the Art of Classical Greece (1988) 43-45. 10 O. Palagia, LIMC 4 (1988) 756-58 nos 555-579; and see also 837 no. 1695. 11 A young, garlanded Hercules holds out a small cornucopia in his left hand in a lost Pompeian wall-painting: J. Boardman, LIMC 4 (1988) 837 no. 1694; the pose is otherwise unlike that of our bronze, but is somewhat similar to a Herakles on a coin of Septimius Severus from Maionia in Lydia: SNG 27, Lydia (1947) pi- 7, 237. 12 A bearded Herakles in the Louvre has a pose similar to our figure, but he has nothing in his extended right hand, although he was probably meant to hold a cup: Palagia, LIMC 4 (1988) 769 no. 841. Compare also a bronze Hercules said to be from Britain, in a sale catalogue: J. M. Eisenberg, Gods and Mortals (1989) no. 86.

points to kingship, and the pose and modelling to Helle- nistic times; the bronze may itself be Hellenistic, but equally may have been made during the Roman period, perhaps in the first century a.d. In the latter case, did the maker knowingly copy a portrait-statue of a Hellenistic king (and for what purpose?) or did he regard it merely as a figure of Herakles? There is no way of knowing. Analysis of the bronze by Susan La Niece of the British Museum Research Laboratory shows that it is a bronze and not a brass, and is thus not certainly Roman, but could be Hellenistic, as high-lead bronze (there is more than 15% lead in the alloy) 'came into use, particularly for largish castings like this figure, in the late Hellenistic

period and continued into the Roman period. There is

nothing about the metal composition which would exclude either a Ptolemaic or a Roman origin'13. If this is indeed a portrait, is it possible to make any sort of identification? Amongst the published royal portraits of the Hellenistic period collected by Gisela Richter14 those of the early Ptolemies stand out as probabilities, and Ptolemy III Euergetes does so in particular. Unfor-

tunately, recognising Ptolemies is not a precise art, and no named portraits of the early Ptolemies survive. Coins are most useful, and very fine portraits are found on these, but they are not always consistent in their likenesses, and some are posthumous issues, where the accu-

racy of the physiognomy may not be absolutely certain. The most important work on Ptolemaic portraits is that of Helmut Kyrieleis, who has gathered together a great many certain, probable and possible representations of these rulers of Egypt on coins, gems and in sculpture15. It would seem from Kyrieleis' work that of the Ptolemies where identification has been made, neither Ptolemy Soter or Ptolemy Philadelphos are likely for our bronze, but that it is a good candidate for Ptolemy Euergetes or

13 British Museum Research Laboratory Report by S. La Niece, no. 5906/33836S of 28 November 1989. 14 G.M.A. Richter, The Portraits of the Greeks 3 (1965). 15 H. Kyrieleis, Bildnisse der Ptolemaer (= Archaologische Forschun- gen 2, 1975).

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for the fourth Ptolemy, Philopator; later rulers can be ruled out as their portraits are very different in appearance from the head of our figure. Several of the Euer- getes portraits have a distinct similarity to ours, particularly the Copenhagen and the Durham marble heads (Kyrieleis C 3 and C 5); the marble head from Sparta (C 8) and the Dresden terracotta head (C 13) are not unlike. Of those identified as Philopator, only the marble head in Budapest (D 4) and the stone head in Amsterdam (D 7) are at all similar to the British Museum bronze, but other Philopator heads are very badly damaged. Ptolemy IV on coins exhibits a nose somewhat pointed at the tip, not like the straight nose of our figure, but Ptolemy Ill's nose, although straight in some representations, is also pointed in this way on several coins (mostly issued under Ptolemy IV). It should be said that the small scale of the bronze and the possibility that the nose is worn makes arguments concerning its shape of dubious value. Other aids to identification are even more tenuous than the similarities (or lack of them) of facial likenesses mentioned above. Does the cornucopia held by our figure point to any particular Ptolemy? Except for those of queens, the cornucopia as the main device on the reverse of coins does not apparently occur before Ptolemy Euer- getes, and even these are posthumous issues produced in Phoenicia under Philopator; it does not seem to be found (as the principal device) on coins of Philopator himself, but recurs on coins of Ptolemy V Epiphanes, but not on those of later Ptolemies, Euergetes then seems a possibility, even though his cornucopia does not exhibit the ear of wheat shown on coins of his queen, Bere- nike16, but presumably her cornucopia was peculiar to her alone. The sword held by the figure may be a direct reference, either to Euergetes' victory in 246-45 B.C. in the Third Syrian War, or to Philopator's success in the Battle of Raphia in 217.

16 H.A. Troxell, The American Numismatic Society, Museum Notes 28, 1983, 65.

Ptolemies adopting the attributes of Herakles hark back to Alexander the Great's assumption of the hero's char- acteristics. Both Alexander and Ptolemy I Soter (and hence the later Ptolemies) traced their descendance from Herakles, and Alexander's and Ptolemy II Philadelphos' ancestry in the hero is referred to by Theocritus in his Seventeenth Idyll. The lost elephant-hunters' inscription at Adulis mentioned Herakles as an ancestor of Ptolemy III17. Like other rulers, the Ptolemies sought in this way to legitimise their status18. Olga Palagia has dis- cussed Herakles in ruler portraiture19 and she states that 'no representation of a ruler as Herakles is securely attested before Alexander'. She points out that the early Ptolemies were anxious 'to appear as reincarnations of Alexander-Herakles'20. Ptolemy II Philadelphos carries the club of Herakles, although he wears the elephant's head of Africa, in a bronze statuette in the British Museum21. A bronze relief medallion found at Galjub in the Delta22 has a bust with a lion-skin on the shoulder and a club. It was identified by Margarete Bieber as a portrait of Ptolemy III23 and Kyrieleis agrees with her attribution as Euergetes24. There is thus no difficulty in postulating that our 'Her- akles' is a Ptolemy. It seems very likely that the British Museum bronze statuette is based ultimately on a full- scale or colossal (and probably bronze) statue of Ptolemy III Euergetes (246-222/21 B.C.). It may have been made during the reign of his 'Father-loving' succes- sor, showing him before he earned his nickname Try- phon ('Glutton'); the proffering of the cornucopia could represent his title of 'Benefactor'.

17 A. Boeckh and J. Franz, Corpus Inscriptionum Graecarum 3 (1853) no. 5127; W. Dittenberger, Orientis Graeci Inscriptiones Selectae (1903) no. 54. 18 Vollkommer op. c. ( supra note 9) 88-90. 19 Boreas 9, 1986, 137-51. 20 ibid. 1 43f. 21 EA 38442: Kyrieleis op.c. (supra note 15) pl. 9. 22 A. Ippel, Der Bronzefund von Galjub (1922) pl. 7, 73. 23 M. Bieber, The Sculpture of the Hellenistic Age (1955) 91 and fig- 34i- 24 Kyrieleis op.c. (supra note 15) 38.

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LIST OF PLATES

PI. 2 1 Bronze statuette. H. 29,9 cm. London, British Museum GR 1 824.4-46.1 3. Phot. Copyright British Museum.

ZUSAMMENFASSUNG*

Eine Bronzestatuette im Britischen Museum ( Taf.21 ), die aufgrund verschiedener Eigenheiten (Diadem, Schwert und ein Flillhorn in der ausgestreckten Rechten) bisher Herakles genannt wurde, wird hier als kleine Kopie der Portratstatue eines hellenistischen Herrschers gedeutet. Es konnte Ptolemaios III. Euergetes gemeint sein; das Original war jedoch moglicherweise eine postume, unter Ptolemaios IV. entstandene Darstellung. Die Bronze stammt aus ptolemaisch/romischer Zeit.

* Ubersetzung: Redaktion

I 10



21

1 I

2 3

4 5



NOT HERAKLES, A PTOLEMY

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