THE GROUP OF DAOCHOS AT DELPHI, AND LYSIPPOS.
If in these later years our knowledge of Skopas has been greatly augmented by the discovery of the Tegea heads (Fig. [73]), that of Lysippos has been almost revolutionized. With the discovery in 1894 at Delphi of the group of statues dedicated by the Thessalian Daochos[2023] in honor of various members of his house, whose dates covered nearly two centuries,[2024] an entirely new impetus was given to the study of the last of the great Greek sculptors. Homolle immediately recognized the fourth-century origin of the group, and at first pronounced the statue of Agias Lysippan;[2025] later he saw in the types, poses, and proportions of the group the mixed influences of Praxiteles, Skopas, and Lysippos, but referred the Agias to the school of Skopas,[2026] while still later he again pronounced it Lysippan.[2027] But its true character was not destined to be long in doubt. When Erich Preuner[2028] found almost the same metrical inscription, which was on the base of the best preserved statue of the group, that of Agias (Pl. [28] and Fig. [68]),[2029] in the traveling journal of Stackelberg,[2030] copied from a base in Pharsalos, the Thessalian home of Daochos, with the additional information that Lysippos of Sikyon made the statue, our views of the work of that artist had to undergo a thorough revision. For this discovery brought the Agias—if not the others of the group—into direct relation to Lysippos by documentary evidence, while the easily recognized Lysippan characteristics of the statue—the slender body and limbs, the small head, the proportions and pose—confirmed this connection on stylistic grounds. It became clear that Daochos had set up a series of statues in honor of his ancestors both at Pharsalos and Delphi. Whether the Thessalian group was of bronze, as is generally held, owing to the widespread belief that Lysippos worked only in metal, and the Delphian group was composed of contemporary marble copies of those originals, will be discussed further on. If the marble group was a copy, we may infer that it reproduced the original statues, not mechanically and laboriously as was often the case in Roman days, but accurately; for having employed a noted artist in the one case, the dedicator would have desired an accurate reproduction of the work in the other.
PLATE 28
Statue of the Pancratiast Agias, from Delphi. Museum of Delphi.
Fig. 68.—Head from the Statue of Agias (Pl. [28]). Museum of Delphi.
PLATE 29
Statue of the Apoxyomenos, after Lysippos or his School. Vatican Museum, Rome.