CHAPTER IV

SOPHOKLES AND HIS RELATION TO VASE PAINTING

Sophokles appears to have enjoyed together with Euripides a large share of popularity in the fourth and third centuries, and it is well known that with the Roman tragedians he was a very important factor. It must be held as passing strange that we can point to but few monuments inspired by him. One feels that there is abundant material in the _Antigone_, for example, to have aroused both painters and sculptors, and yet there is, so far as I know, no trace in Greek art of any Antigone scene that owes its existence to Sophokles. It is, however, true that tragedies which were known in ancient times as among the most celebrated, and which are to-day counted the masterpieces of Greek tragedy, were often particularly neglected by the artists. How meagre is the record of monuments based on the _Prometheus_, the _Ion_, or the _Oedipus Rex_! The reputation of a play cannot be taken as any guaranty, therefore, that the artist found in it the required motives. The gentle and calm Sophokles, who ‘made men as they ought to be and not as they are,’ wrote in a grand and dignified manner that charmed the people of his own time and won the praise and admiration of all posterity. How then is one to account for the small part that he played in ancient art? It seems to me that it rests on the fact that Sophokles was not a creative power. Say what we may of the elegance and grace of his style and the perfection of his diction, a glance at his extant work convinces us that he seldom allowed his imagination to carry him beyond the bounds of the accepted form of a myth. He preserved the mythological fabric with religious fervour and altered little. He was neither an iconoclast nor an innovator. The gods and heroes in their old-time relations to each other and to humanity served him fully, and he showed an unwillingness either to shatter the popular faith or to disturb it with new doctrines. So long, therefore, as nothing new mythologically was introduced, the value of the Sophoklean plays, from an artist’s point of view, was far below the fresh and dashing manner of Euripides, who left the old and beaten paths and added new chapters to the lives of the heroes and the exploits of the gods. It has already been observed that where Aischylos broke new ground he was followed by the painter and sculptor. The novelty of the _Eumenides_ appealed to the artist even more strongly than to the public; here was something absolutely new, unheard of before. So it was with the _Choephoroi_, and we have already seen that of the extant plays these two are the only ones that influenced vase painting. Had Sophokles grafted new branches on the old trees of myths he would likewise have had a far larger following among ancient artists. As it is, it does not seem possible to point to a single vase painting that is indisputably a Sophoklean product, and one must be perplexed by the strange problem. To be sure conjectures have not been wanting, and here and there a painting has been named in connexion with Sophokles. But this is by no means a frequent occurrence, and there has never been any consensus of opinion among archaeologists that this or that picture _must_ be the outgrowth of one of his extant tragedies. I have accordingly not published any painting under this head. It seemed best merely to point out the few instances where Sophoklean influences have been seen by some, and leave the student free to determine each case for himself[153].

_Antigone._ A Lucanian amphora in the Brit. Mus., cat. iv. F 175. A. 2. Pub. Reinach-Millingen, _Peintures_, pl. 54; cf. Hirzel in _Arch. Ztg._ 1863, p. 70, who bases the scene on vs. 376 ff. It may be remarked that the oriental cap of the king does not at all fit the position of the Theban Kreon.

_Oed. Rex._ Painting pub. Inghirami, _Vasi fitt._ iii. pl. 248 = Overbeck, _Bildwerke_, pl. 2. 11; cf. _ibid._ p. 62 ff., where vs. 316 ff. are thought of. A much more satisfactory interpretation is that kindly sent me by Professor Carl Robert. The scene represents Chryses before Agamemnon and is based on _Il._ 1.

_Trachiniai._ Herakles wrestles with the river god Acheloös in the presence of Deianeira. Reinach-Millingen, _op. cit._ pl. 10. B. 11. Robert in _Arch. Ztg._ 1883, p. 262, refers the painting to vs. 9–24 of the prologue, and calls my attention in a letter to another similar painting, unpublished, in the Jatta-Ruvo coll. no. 1092.

Two of the lost plays that have been held by some to be represented on vase paintings have already been referred to above[154].