MYRON.
Myron of Eleutherae in Attica worked at Athens in the first half of the fifth century b.c. Although he had not entirely abandoned the archaic style (notably, in his rendering of hair, Pliny, H. N. xxxiv., 58), he was distinguished for his skill in representing life. His power lay partly in the rendering of vigorous movement in sculpture, as in his athletic statues, and partly in a realistic imitation of nature, as in his famous cow.
No original works of Myron are extant. His best known work, the Discobolos, is preserved in copies, one of which is described below. The bronze statuette of Marsyas in the Bronze Room may be studied after a group of Athenè and Marsyas by Myron.
Fig. 5.
250. Graeco-Roman copy of the bronze Discobolos of Myron. A young athlete is represented in the act of hurling the disk. He has swung it back, and is about to throw it to the furthest possible distance before him. The head, as here attached, looks straight to the ground, but in the original it looked more backwards as in a copy formerly in the Massimi palace at Rome. (Cf. Lucian, Philopseud. 18.) Compare a gem in the British Museum (Fig. 5; Cat. of Gems, No. 742, pl. G), which is inscribed ΥΑΚΙΝΘΟϹ. According to a judgment of Quintilian, the laboured complexity of the statue is extreme, but any one who should blame it on this ground would do so under a misapprehension of its purpose, inasmuch as the merit of the work lies in its novelty and difficulty. "Quid tam distortum et elaboratum, quam est ille discobolos Myronis? si quis tamen, ut parum rectum, improbet opus, nonne ab intellectu artis abfuerit, in qua vel praecipue laudabilis est ipsa illa novitas ac difficultas?"—Quint. Inst. Orat., ii., 13. 10.—Found in 1791 in Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli. Townley Coll.
Marble; height, 5 feet 5 inches. Restorations:—Nose, lips, chin, piece in neck, part of disk and r. hand; l. hand; piece under r. arm; pubis; r. knee; a small piece in r. leg, and parts of the toes. Specimens, I., pl. 29; Mus. Marbles, XI., pl. 44; Clarac, V., pl. 860, No. 2194 b; Ellis, Townley Gallery, I., p. 241; Guide to Graeco-Roman Sculptures, I., No. 135; Stereoscopic, No. 149; Wolters, No. 452.