Briseis led to Agamemnon

Title: Briseis led to Agamemnon
Repository: British Museum
Alternative: Kylix Old Catalogue 831 Vase E76
Creator: Briseis Painter
Photographer: Lowenstam, Steven
Creator Display: attributed to Briseis Painter (Ancient Greek vase painter, active 510-ca. 470 BCE)
Description: Pottery: red-figured kylix. INTERIOR: seated old man and man. On the left an old man with beard and receding hair is seated on a simple stool with a striped cushion. He is dressed in long chiton and himation and has a red wreath in his hair. He holds a plain stick in his left hand and gestures towards the bearded man facing him with his right hand. This man wears a himation and shoes and has a red wreath in his hair. He leans to the left on a knotty stick and is seen in three-quarter back view. His left arm, covered in drapery, is bent back to hold the top of his stick which supports him under his left armpit. He gestures with his right hand towards the seated man. Border: dotted cross square alternating with five units of running maeander (five-stroke, clockwise); irregularities at 7 o'clock (three and a half maeander units) and at 8 and 9 o'clock (only four units). EXTERIOR: Briseis. Side A (lower): Briseis being led away from Achilles. On the far left a bearded herald in short chiton, chlamys, pilos hat with red ties and boots with horizontal divisions (dilute glaze) starts to move away to the left but turns back his head and torso so that his right leg is also seen from the back (dilute glaze wash in hair and beard). He holds a kerykeion up in his left hand; his right hand grips the draped hand or wrist of a woman behind him. She is Briseis and wears a chiton and a himation pulled up over the back of her head, faces to the left, a double red band around her head. Behind her is a second bearded herald (dilute glaze wash for beard). He wears a pilos hat with red ties, horizontally striped boots (dilute glaze) and a chlamys that covers the short chiton that he is presumably wearing beneath it. In the centre a bearded man in a himation leans on a knotty stick to the right, his right hand on his hip, his left arm hidden in his drapery. He has a red fillet in his hair. He faces the tent of Achilles which takes the form of four (only two shown) plain posts with simple block bases with a large striped textile with a fringed edge draped over them. Up in the folds of this marquee are, on the left, a Corinthian helmet with a long crest on a square hook or shelf and, on the right, a scabbard with a red strap. Next to the scabbard is planted a spear. In the centre of the tent sits Achilles on an elaborate folding stool (animal legs) with a cushion decorated with zigzags. He wears shoes and a himation which envelops all but the upper part of his face. He has a red fillet in his hair and dilute wash in his wavy hair. His left arm is wrapped around a knotty stick. Behind the tent, on the extreme right, stands a bearded elder in long chiton, himation and shoes; he also has a red hair-band. He holds a staff or sceptre in his right hand. Side Β (upper): Briseis being led back. On the left a bearded man, wearing a himation pulled up over the back of his head and a red fillet, leans on a knotty stick, his right leg frontal: he is presumably Agamemnon. In front of him stands a bearded elder to the left. He is dressed in long chiton (dilute glaze border), himation, shoes and a red fillet and rests his right hand on top of a plain stick. Behind him stands a second bearded elder similarly dressed and accoutred but facing to the right. In the centre is a fluted column with a plain block base but a Doric capital with architrave above. To the right of the central column a herald in pilos hat with red ties, chlamys and red thonged high sandals moves to the right. In his right hand he holds a kerykeion; his left hand is raised inside his chlamys; at his hip is a scabbard. In front of him is Briseis in chiton (upper folds done with dilute glaze) and himation pulled up over the back of her head. She has a double red band around her head. In front of her is a second herald who leads her by the hand - hers within its drapery. He is moving right but has turned back to look at her, his head to the left, torso and right leg frontal. He is dressed in short chiton, chlamys and pilos hat with red ties and holds a kerykeion up in his left hand. In front of him, on the extreme right, is a second column, as the first. These two columns are probably intended to be the entrance porch to Agamemnon's more palatial tent, out through which the two heralds are leading Briseis. Under either handle: a solid stone seat with dilute glaze strokes. Ground line: single reserved line. Relief line contour throughout (except for hair); dilute glaze for minor interior markings; added red for inscriptions. --The British Museum Williams, Dyfri, Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum: Great Britain 17, British Museum 9, London, BMP, 1993; A Catalogue of the Greek and Etruscan Vases in the British Museum, London, William Nicol, 1851; Walters, H B; Forsdyke, E J; Smith, C H, Catalogue of Vases in the British Museum, I-IV, London, BMP, 1893
Inscription: Inscription Script: Greek Inscription Language: Greek Inscription Content: Interior: AVIOΣKIOΣVIΣ Exterior, lower: ΔVIOΣL Exterior, upper: AVIOVIOΣKI Inscription Comment: Nonsense inscriptions --The British Museum
View: Side
Coverage: Attica, Central Greece and Euboea, Greece (creation) Vulci, Lazio, Italy (discovery)
Temporal: ca. 480 BCE
Subject: Book 1 Iliad Book 2-16
Style Period: Red-figure Attic (Mainland Greek pottery styles)
Work Type: kylikes
Date: -0485/-0475
Identifier: Lowenstam_VRC_00466
Item Locator: Box 2, Section 2
Rights: In Copyright
Dc Rights Holder: University of Oregon, Department of Classics
Local Collection Name: Steven Lowenstam Collection
Type: Image
Format: image/tiff
Measurements: Width: 38.2 cm Diameter: 30 cm Diameter: 17.5 cm (of tondo) Height: 12 cm Diameter: 12 cm (of exterior ground line) Diameter: 11.2 cm (of foot)
Material: pottery | painted
Set: Lowenstam Collection of Ancient Western Art and Archaeology
Primary Set: Lowenstam Collection of Ancient Western Art and Archaeology
Institution: University of Oregon
Cultural Context: Attic (culture)
Id Current Repository: 1843,1103.92