303 K, L, M. Group of three female figures (or, perhaps, a group of two, with a third figure less closely associated, the figure K being made of a different block from L and M). The figures are seated on rocks, levelled on the top, and in the case of L, M, cut in step form to suit the composition. The rocks are covered with draperies. These three figures are considerably more complete in Carrey's drawings than now, and the motives can best be understood with the aid of the drawings. The figure K half turned her head towards the central scene. The right arm was bent at the elbow towards the front of the body. The figure L was headless in Carrey's time. The right arm, according to Carrey's drawing, was bent towards the right shoulder, as if the action had been that of drawing up the edge of the mantle with the right hand. The body of this figure is bent forward and the feet drawn far back, as would be the case with a person wishing to spring up. This motive forms a contrast to that of the reclining figure (M), whose right arm rests in her companion's lap, and whose tranquil attitude and averted gaze, shown by Carrey's drawing to have been directed towards the angle of the pediment, seem to indicate that the news of the birth has not yet reached her. K wears sandals, a chiton with diploïdion, and a mantle of thick substance which passes across the knees, and over the left shoulder, above which it may have been held with the left hand. L wears a fine chiton, confined with a cord beneath the arms, and a mantle covering the back and passing across the knees. M wears a fine chiton, confined at the waist by a girdle, and has a mantle wrapped about her legs. She appears to have worn a bracelet on the right arm.
On comparing the composition of this triad with that of the triad placed next to Helios in the opposite half of the pediment a curious analogy of treatment may be observed. The so-called Theseus (D), like the reclining figure (M), seems to be quite unconscious of the great event which is being announced, and they are turned as by law of attraction to the groups of Day and Night which bound the scene on either side. The central figure on either triad seems only half aroused, while on either side the figure nearest the central action appears to have heard the news of the birth. If the triad near Selenè are the Three Fates, as Visconti and many of his successors have supposed, their place would more naturally be in the central part of the composition, or at least they might be supposed to be more on the alert with respect to what was passing. By others it has been argued that the place of this triad in immediate succession to Selenè, and the direction in which the figure nearest to the angle (M) is turned, would point to some mythic connection between these three figures and the Goddess of the Moon. Such a connection is suggested by the names given to the group by Welcker, who saw in them the three daughters of Cecrops, Aglauros, Hersè, and Pandrosos, mythic impersonations of the Dew, who have a conspicuous place in Attic legend, though Pandrosos alone of the three seems to have been honoured with worship at Athens. The same desire to connect this triad with Selenè has led Brunn (Ber. d. k. bayer. Akad. Phil. hist. Cl., 1874, ii., p. 16) to see in them personifications of clouds.
Among the writers who have regarded K as separate from L and M, the most common opinion has been that K is Hestia; L and M have been called Aphroditè in the lap of Thalassa (Ronchaud), or of Peitho (Petersen), or Thalassa, the Sea, in the lap of Gaia, the Earth (Waldstein).
K. Mus. Marbles, VI., pl. 10; Michaelis, pl. 6, fig. 15; Murray, II., pl. 7; Mitchell, Selections, pl. 6; Stereoscopic, No. 108.
L. M. Mus. Marbles, VI., pl. 11; Baumeister, Denkmaeler, p. 1184, fig. 1374; Michaelis, pl. 6, fig. 16; Overbeck, Gr. Plast., 3rd ed., I., p. 308, fig. 63; Murray, II., pl. 7; Stereoscopic, No. 108; Waldstein, Essays, pl. 8; Mitchell, Selections, pl. 6.
303 N. Selenè.—It has been already stated that the horse's head in the right-hand angle of the pediment belongs to the Goddess of the Moon, who is represented by the torso cast in plaster (N) which stands next to it. The original of this torso, now at Athens, was discovered in 1840 on the east side of the Parthenon. The arms and head are wanting, the body is cut off below the waist, as only the upper part of the figure was shown on the pediment. The dress is a sleeveless chiton girt at the waist and fastened on each shoulder. The bosom is crossed diagonally by two bands which pass round to the back. Two large dowel holes in the girdle and two others on the shoulders mark where metallic ornaments have been attached. On the back is a remnant of drapery extending from shoulder to shoulder; this is probably part of a peplos, the ends of which may have fallen over the arms.
It has usually been assumed that Selenè was driving a chariot, and this has been conclusively proved by Sauer, who found the heads of two horses still in position on the pediment, and indications of a fourth head now lost. A theory recently suggested that Selenè rides a single horse is thereby rendered untenable.
Michaelis, pl. 6, figs. 17, 17a; cf. Wolters, pp. 256, 259; C. Smith, Journ. of Hellen. Studies, IX., p. 8; Stereoscopic, No. 109; Sauer, Athenische Mittheilungen, XVI., pl. 3, p. 84.
303 O. Horse's Head.—The head was so placed in the pediment that the muzzle projected over the cornice; in order to adjust it securely in this position, a portion of the lower jaw was cut away. The inner side of the top of the head has also been cut away, in order to give room for the upper member of the pediment. This head presents, as might have been expected, a marked contrast in motive to the pair in the opposite angle. The heads of the horses of Helios are thrown up with fiery impatience as they spring from the waves; the downward inclination of the head here described indicates that the car of Selenè is about to vanish below the horizon. In the whole range of ancient art there is, perhaps, no work in marble in which the sculptor has shown such complete mastery over his material. The nostrils "drink the air"; the fiery expression of the eye, the bold, sharply defined outlines of the bony structure so skilfully opposed to the sensitive flexibility of the nose, and the brawny tenseness of the arched neck, are so combined in this noble work that the praise bestowed on it by Goethe is not extravagant. "This work," he says, "whether created by the imagination of the artist or seen by him in nature, seems the revelation of a prototype; it combines real truth with the highest poetical conception." Behind the ears is a dowel hole; another is on the nose between the eyes and the mouth, and a third on the inner corner of the mouth. These show where a metal bridle was attached. On the crest of the hogged mane are eleven smaller holes, in which some metallic ornament must have been inserted. Two horses' heads still remain in the angle of the pediment. See above, [303 N].