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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 May 2015
A curious scene (fig. 1) decorates the Attic lekythos BS 423 in the Antikenmuseum at Basel. It was drawn not long before 480 B.C. by the Diosphos Painter, a fairly prolific craftsman who rarely devoted to his pictures as much care and imagination as he did in this case. Specializing in the decoration of small vases such as lekythoi, alabastra and small neck-amphorae he is among those conservative painters in Athens’ Kerameikos of the earlier fifth century who continued to use the old black-figure technique which most workshops had by then abandoned in favour of the new red-figure technique invented around 530 B.C. But while the bulk of his work is in black-figure, most of his better pieces are in so-called Six’s technique. This technique is named after the Dutch scholar Jan Six who first studied it and involves drawing the figures on an all-black background by combining incised lines and added colours (mostly white, but for more elaborate scenes also pink and red). Of East Greek origin it came to Athens at the same time red-figure was invented, probably introduced by Nikosthenes whose workshop appears to have been instrumental in its promotion during the last decades of the sixth century. To take full advantage of the possibilities offered by it was, however, left to the Sappho and above all to his colleague, the Diosphos Painter, who improved its decorative appeal by achieving a more balanced distribution between added colours and incised lines. Substantial parts of his pictures are left in incised outline, without any colour added, and he is particularly fond of compositions in which an all-black figure drawn in pure outline contrasts with one that is painted in added white.
1 Purchased in 1965; provenience unknown. Ht. 19.2; diammouth4.4;diam foot5.1 cms. Intact except for the foot which has been broken and mended and for a few minor chips missing from the mouth and the shoulder. Surface worn in parts. Published in CVA Basel 1. pi. 56. 8 and 10 (which has now appeared — at last!).
2 See Haspels, C.H.E. Attic Black-Figured Lekythoi (Paris 1936), 94 ff., 232 ff.;Google Scholar Beazley, J.D. Attic Black-figure Vase-Painters (Oxford 1956), 508 ff., 702, 716;Google Scholar id. Attic Red-figure Vase-Painters, 2nd ed. (Oxford 1963), 300 ff., 973; id. Paralipomena (Oxford 1971), 248 ff.; Haspels, C.H.E. ‘Le peintre de Diosphos’, RA 1972, 103 ff.;Google Scholar Kurtz, D.C. Athenian White Lekythoi (Oxford 1975), 118 f.;Google Scholar and for further references Hornbostel, W. Aus Gräbern und Heiligtümern (Mainz 1980), 110 no. 65.Google Scholar
3 See most recently Haspels, C.H.E. ‘A Lekythos in Six’s Technique’, Muse 3 (1969), 24 ff.Google Scholar: Kurtz 116 ff.: further references are given bv Hornbostel 112 no. 66.
4 This is another example of Nikosthenic ‘Ionicisms’, to be added to those assembled by Jackson, D.A. East Greek Influence on Attic Vases (JHS Suppl. Paper 13) (1976), 38 ff.Google Scholar For a general overview of the Nikosthenic workshop see most conveniently Eismann, M. ‘Nikosthenic Amphorai’, The J. Paul Getty Museum Journal 1 (1974), 52 ff.Google Scholar (with further references).
5 See e.g. the lekythoi Boston 98.885 (Haspels,Lekythoi [n. 2 above] pi. 38.6); Paris, Bibl. Nationale 492 (CVA 2 pi. 95.1); Sotheby Catalogue, 13 July 1970, no. 106.
6 As e.g. on the cup Oxford 1966. 446 painted by Epiktetos around 500 B.C.: JdI 44 (1929), 191 fig. 34; J.D. Beazley, Attic Red-figure Vase-Painters2 (n. 2 above) 76.70; id. Paralipomena 328.70.
7 Erotic scenes are not usually depicted as taking place in thegynaikeion (for which see Götte, E. Frauengemachbilder in der Vasenmalerei des 5. Jahrhunderts (1957),Google Scholar let alone when they include satyrs who always practise their mischief out of doors.
8 Neumann, G. Gesten und Gebärden in der griechischen Kunst (Berlin 1965), 100 CrossRefGoogle Scholar describes a similar gesture as expressing ‘eine Mischung von Bewunderung und Zweifel, Bejahung und Verneinung, Erstaunen und Erschrecken’.
9 See esp.Lys. 151, 825–8; Thesm. 215,236–47. 590;,Eccl. 12–13. As Licht, H. Sexual Life in Ancient Greece (London 1932), 506 Google Scholar summarized: ‘men liked women to remove the hairs from their privy parts’.
10 See esp. Thesm. 236–47.
11 The University of Mississippi, David, M. Robinson Memorial Collection 1977.Google Scholar 3.112; J.D. Beazley, Attic Red-figure Vase-Painters2 (n. 2 above) 331.20; id. Paralipomena 361. We owe the correct interpretation of the scene to Hauser, F. ‘Aristophanes und Vasenbilder’, OeJh 12 (1909), 85 ff.Google Scholar
12 See e.g. Ar. Thesm. 590.
13 Plato Com. fr. 174, 14 f. (Edmonds).
14 See Ar. Thesm. 247. The girl on the kylix in Mississippi holds an object in her right hand which Hauser (loc. cit.) was unable to identify; it seems most likely to be a sponge.
15 J.D. Beazley, Paralipomena 333.9 bis; Williams, D.J.R. ‘Apollodoros and a New Amazon Cup in a Private Collection’, JHS 97 (1977), 167 n. 56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
The scene is illustrated in colour by Boardman, J. and La Rocca, E. Eros in Greece (London 1978), 111 Google Scholar but its exact meaning appears to have escaped their attention (ibid. 110; I am indebted to Mr Ken Sheedy for making me aware of the existence of this publication).
16 See Scheibler, I. ‘Exaleiptra’, JdI 79 (1964), 72 ff.Google Scholar
17 See e.g. Ar. Thesm. 236 ff.
18 Brendel, O.J. ‘The Scope and Temperament of Erotic Art in the Greco-Roman World’, in Studies in Erotic Art (New York 1970), 4.Google Scholar
19 See RE 3 A. 1, s.v. ‘Silenos und Satyros’ (A. Hartmann); F. Brommer,Satyroi(Wiirz-burg 1937); LdAW 2707, s.v. ‘Satyrn und Silene’ (K. Schauenburg);.EX4 7, s.v. ‘Satiri e Sileni’ (P.E. Arias).
20 See above all his ‘Zwei griechische Terrakotten’,Archiv für Religionswissenschaft 10 (1907), 331. Cf. also Hartmann (n. 19 above) loc. cit.
21 The best representation is by the Phiale Painter, on a calyx-krater in the Vatican: Beazley, Attic Red-figure Vase-Painters 2 1017 54.
22 Artemidorus, Onirocriticon 2. 12.
