Derveni crater
The Derveni crater is a bronze Greek volute crater from the 4th century BC. Besides the Derveni papyrus , it is the most significant find from the graves of Derveni north of Thessaloniki in Macedonia . It is of a special size and decorated particularly lavishly. The crater is adorned with the representation of a Dionysian Thiasos . Today it is in the Archaeological Museum of Thessaloniki .
Finding circumstances
The crater was discovered in 1962 in Derveni's grave Β. The graves of Derveni are dated to the second half of the 4th century BC. Dated. Grave Β is the most richly furnished, with a length of three meters and of particular size. The crater had fallen from the pedestal intended for it when it was found. It contained the ashes of a man and a younger woman, pieces of gold and a coin of Philip II of Macedonia , as well as the bones of a sheep. A variety of bronze and silver pieces were found in the tomb, including weapons and harness, as well as Attic ceramics. The circumstances of the find suggest that the person buried was a warrior, perhaps a member of the cavalry.
construction
The particularly tin-rich bronze alloy made from 15 percent tin and 85 percent copper gives the Derveni crater a bright, golden shimmer. With a weight of 40 kilograms, the crater is almost 77 centimeters high to the mouth, the volute handles protrude a further 14 centimeters beyond. The mouth lip with a diameter of 40 centimeters is covered on the upper side with a bronze pearl wreath and is carried by a convex-concave curved ring. The neck of the crater is slightly concave. It consists of a narrow upper and a wider lower zone. At the border of the two neck zones, the separately manufactured part of the mouth is connected to the lower part of the crater: X-ray examinations showed a 12 millimeter wide overlap here. The body of the crater tapers in an oval line over 54 centimeters in height from 51 centimeters in diameter below the shoulder to 17 centimeters on the floor above the bell-shaped foot of 23 centimeters in diameter and 4 centimeters in height. Due to the small size of the foot, Beryl Barr-Sharrar suspects that a separate stand originally belonged to the crater. The intricately crafted volute handles are made up of several separately cast parts. Its sieve was found along with the crater; it measures 37 centimeters in diameter. Inside the crater there were remains of a lining made of beeswax and clay.
X-rays showed that the crater was not poured. It is believed that it was created by hammering a bronze disc, the reliefs were created by hammering from the inside and subsequent hammering from the outside, for which the crater was repeatedly filled with pitch and emptied in many operations. It is estimated that five artisans took about 18 months to make the crater.
decor
Mouth, neck, foot
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The mouth lip of the crater is adorned with an embossed Ionic kyma . A lesbian kyma is engraved on the ring below and inlaid with silver-plated copper elements ; it is set with individually manufactured and soldered bronze flowers and palmettes . In the places where they are missing, you can see delicately engraved symbols and letters, they are interpreted as marks for the goal groove . The foot of the crater is also adorned with a lesbian kyma. Twelve separately made animal figures embossed in bronze are applied to the upper, narrower zone of the neck. The following are lined up in a clockwise direction: a lion with a hunted deer in its mouth, a boar, a panther, two griffins , a stag, another panther, another stag kneeling on its forelegs, then a third panther, raising its paw , a ram, a deer calf and a lioness. The lower, wider area of the neck is covered with two soldered silver ivy tendrils that are knotted on the front and back of the crater and end in berries. The shoulder of the crater is adorned with driven tongues.
Vascular body
The surrounding frieze on the body of the crater is embossed and shows a Dionysian Thiasos . At the front of the crater, Dionysus sits naked on a rock covered by his cloak, his right arm over his head, the panther, his companion in mythology, sits at his feet and raises his paw. Ariadne sits to the left of Dionysus ; he has put his right leg across her lap. Moving clockwise around the crater, the following figures can initially be seen: Two maenads diverging in an ecstatic dance; a deer, which they carry, each holding it by one leg, hangs between them. The left handle is attached above the deer. What follows, on the back of the crater, are two maenads - one, drunk or exhausted, half-naked, sinking onto the lap of the other, who is holding it with her left arm. To the left of this another maenad is dancing in ecstasy, holding an object together with the exhausted one to her right, of which only remnants of the silver inlay are left. In front of the left maenad stands a satyr in a stretched upright position, his phallus erect, his left hand raised in a gesture. A bearded man is walking down a slope under the right handle. His right foot is bare, while he wears a boot on the left, forward foot. He wears a short robe, similar to a skirt, which leaves his upper body free, and a cloak - chiton and chlamys . He carries a spear in his right hand, the left is raised above his head. The naming of this figure, called "one-shoeed" (ancient Greek μονοκρήπις, monocrepis ) in scientific literature , has not yet been clearly clarified. Pentheus or Lycurgus were suspected, further interpretations were also considered: An episode is told of Jason in which he lost a shoe while wading through a river. In Magnesia in Thessaly you only put on one shoe if you wanted to find a better grip on difficult terrain. Adolf Greifenhagen suspects the buried in the monocrepis of the Derveni crater, who participates in Thiasos in the afterlife. Finally, the last figure of the frieze, again on the front of the crater, but turned away from Dionysus and Ariadne and facing the bearded man without a right shoe, is again a maenad, carrying a small child over her left shoulder, which she is holding by the ankle. Below the main frieze described is a narrow zone in which animals are depicted, as on the neck of the crater: two griffins with a captured deer, a lion and a panther with a slain bull, and a deer calf.
Statuettes on the shoulder of the vessel
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The jewelry of the crater includes four separately cast bronze figures, they sit on the shoulder of the crater, each on either side of the handle. The figures are each 20 cm high and weigh about one and a half kilograms. Dionysus sits on the left at the front, his right leg crossed over the left. He has stretched out one arm in the direction of a maenad sitting on the other handle, as if to hand her an object (no longer available today). The maenad keeps her head down and her eyes closed. At the back on the left is a satyr, half-lying, his right hand holding his head, and in the other he has a wineskin. A maenad sits on the other handle, half bared, in a twisted position. Remnants of silver on her arm indicate an object once attached there now lost, perhaps a snake, Barr-Sharrar suspects.
Volute handle
The volute handles are made up of several separately cast parts. Even if the handles of the Derveni crater are made much more complex, the scheme of the handles on the other well-known bronze volute craters from the classical period is essentially followed, with modifications or reinterpretations in detail: the tendril work of two counter-rotating spirals is found below the volute also at the Dervenikrater, but partly overgrown by lush palmette decorations. In the Derveni crater, a serpent adorned with silver inlays follows the outer edge of the beaded handle on both sides of the volute handle, its turns replace simple spirals, as can be found in the other bronze volute craters of this time: the small spiral that is found in the bronze craters of this time At the Derveni crater, the time when the connection between the volute and the vascular opening is established is formed by a winding of the snake, which then stretches its head in the opposite direction. At the approach to the horizontal handle, where the handle bulge has been rolling up sideways in bronze volute craters since archaic times, in the Derveni crater the tail of the snake, i.e. only the outer edge of the handle bulge, rolls outwards like a corkscrew. The volutes of the handles are covered with masks of bearded men, a decoration that cannot be found on the other bronze craters from the classical period, even if similar masks found individually were interpreted as parts of volute craters. Barr-Sharrar interprets the men's heads as depictions of Acheloos , Dionysus, Hades and Heracles .
inscription
The Ionic kyma of the crater lip bears the inscription ΑΣΤΙΟΥΝΕΙΟΣ ΑΝΑΞΑΓΟΡΑΙΟΙ ΕΣ ΛΑΡΙΣΑΣ in silver inlaid letters (in the Thessalian dialect of ancient Greek: Ἀστιούνειος Ἀναξαγοραίοι ἐς Λαρ übersetztσας), translated from Astineios (son) of Anaxagoras . The inlays of the inscription in the Ionic kyma are very flat and simple compared to the elaborate inlays on the lesbian kyma underneath, which suggests that the dedication was added later. In any case, it is unclear whether the person named is a previous owner of the crater, perhaps an ancestor of the buried person or the buried person himself.
literature
- Εύγενία Γιούρη (Eugenia Giouri): Ο κρατήρας τού Δερβενίου , (Βιβλιοθήκη της εν Αθήναις Αρχαιολογικής Εταιρείας, 89), Archaeological Society of Athens , Athens 1978th
- Martin Robertson : Monocrepis . In: Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies Vol. 13, 2, 1972, pp. 39-48 ( digitized version ).
- Adolf Greifenhagen : Astiouneios . In: Friedrich Krinzinger , Brinna Otto , Elisabeth Walde -Psenner (Ed.): Research and Findings. Festschrift Bernhard Neutsch . Publishing house of the Institute for Linguistics of the University of Innsbruck, Innsbruck 1980, ISBN 3-85124-074-X , pp. 145–148
- Hannelore Eva Schleiffenbaum: The Greek volute crater. Form, function and meaning of an ancient magnificent vessel. (= European university publications , series 38: Archeology Volume 36) Lang, Frankfurt am Main, Bern, New York, Paris 1991, ISBN 3-631-43477-4 . Pp. 78-80, 402-403.
- Beryl Barr-Sharrar : The Derveni Crater. Masterpiece of Classical Greek Metalwork . The American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Princeton 2008, ISBN 978-0-87661-962-9 .
Remarks
- ↑ Giouri, p. 19.
- ↑ Robertson, pp. 39-41.
- ^ Robertson p. 41.
- ^ Robertson p. 41.
- ↑ Greifenhagen, p. 147.
