Fig. 139. Bronze situla. Watsch.
In the preceding sketch no mention has been made of a very curious form of caestus represented on the bronze situlae found at Bologna and in the Tyrol, because, as Dr. Jüthner has pointed out, this form finds no place in the development of the Greek boxing glove.[[709]] So-called boxing scenes are of common occurrence on these situlae; the form of the weapon is most clearly shown on the well-known situla from Watsch (Fig. [139]), on which two boxers are depicted fighting over a helmet placed on a stand between them and holding in their hands objects exactly resembling modern dumb-bells. In fact one is tempted to suppose that they really are halteres shaped like dumb-bells, and that the scene depicted is not so much a boxing match as some sort of athletic dance. Certainly the style of the performance has as little connexion with true boxing as these objects have with boxing gloves. But the composition of the group seems to show that it really is a crude and barbarous representation of boxing. The helmet placed between the two figures is, of course, the prize for which they are fighting, and cannot possibly represent any sort of barrier between the two combatants as a recent writer has suggested.[[710]] In archaic art the tripods, cauldrons, or helmets which are the objects of competition are frequently represented. In a race the prize is naturally placed at the finish; in a combat it is no less naturally placed between the combatants. The same scheme of composition occurs on the walls of tombs at Tarquinii and Clusium,[[711]] and on the fragment of a black-figured vase in the British Museum found at Daphnae in Egypt (Fig. [140]).[[712]] On the Etruscan tombs the scheme is not confined to boxers. In the Tomba degli Auguri at Tarquinii a pair of wrestlers[[713]] are wrestling over three large bowls placed between them; but no one could suppose for a moment that the bowls were in reality so placed. The numerous athletic scenes on those tombs bear witness to the popularity of athletics and especially of boxing among the Etruscans; but they do not justify us in assuming any connexion between Etruscan art and that of the situlae, nor between Etruscan athletics and the athletics of the Tyrol. The athletic scenes on Etruscan tombs are nothing but imitations of the athletic scenes on the Greek vases which we know were from an early period imported into Etruria. The diskoi, halteres, and himantes differ little from those on the vases, such differences as do occur being possibly due to the fact that the Etruscan artist did not quite understand what he was copying. The scheme of composition is usually Greek; that the particular boxing scheme which we are discussing is Greek is proved by the vase from Daphnae. Such resemblance then as exists between the Etruscan scheme and that on the situlae is clearly due to the fact that both were imitated from the Greeks, unless we are to maintain that the situlae were the original for both Etruscans and Greeks. But if the scheme of composition on the situlae is Greek, what shall we say of the form of caestus? It certainly cannot have been derived from or even suggested by anything that Greek boxers ever wore. Two explanations alone are possible. Either we have a picture of some barbarous form of combat belonging to the Tyrol in which such weapons were used,[[714]] or the makers of the situlae, ignorant of Greek athletics, have mistaken the halteres of the Greeks for weapons used in boxing.
Fig. 140. Fragment of b.-f. situla, in British Museum, B. 124.
The history of Greek boxing may be divided then into three main periods. The first is the period of the soft thongs or meilichai, and extends from Homeric times to the close of the sixth century; the second is that of the “sharp thongs” and sphairai, extending from the fourth century into late Roman times; the third is that of the weighted caestus, though as has been shown it is doubtful whether this was really Greek. The changes in the form of the glove must have greatly modified the style of boxing and even the scanty evidence which we possess allows us to trace to some extent the change in style. For the first period we have the evidence of Homer, and of the painted vases of the sixth and fifth centuries: for the second period we have the evidence of a few Panathenaic vases, and of Theocritus and Apollonius Rhodius, both of whom have left us descriptions of fights which doubtless reflect the practice of their own day: for the last period we have the extremely unreliable evidence of Vergil and other Roman poets. There is also much scattered information referring to different periods contained in the writings of Plutarch, Pausanias, Lucian, and Philostratus. These writers for the most part derive their information from earlier records, and it is often difficult to estimate the value of their evidence. It is, therefore, extremely important to consider first of all in its proper order such evidence as can be dated with certainty. The neglect of this precaution has led to many ill-considered and misleading statements about the Greek boxer. Thus in a well-known dictionary, I find a paragraph constructed with sublime indifference to dates from some sixteen authors, Greek, Latin, and Byzantine, from the time of Homer to that of Eustathius. The events referred to in this miscellaneous collection of writers cover a period of at least a thousand years, and from this farrago of evidence the author has produced a generalised picture of the Greek boxer equally applicable or inapplicable to a Homeric warrior or a Roman gladiator. The result is still worse when a writer like Professor Mahaffy[[715]] bases a wholesale condemnation of Greek boxing on Vergil’s description of the fight between Dares and Entellus and a few stories of uncertain date. Before we consider such criticism in detail we will first see what we can learn from a chronological study of the evidence.
In Homer boxing, like wrestling, is already a specialised sport, though the pankration, which combined the two, did not yet exist. The art of boxing was hereditary in certain families, and custom had already evolved a body of tacitly accepted rules for the regulation of a fight. This is evident not merely from the description in the Iliad, but still more so in the ease with which the suitors arrange all the preliminaries for the impromptu fight between Odysseus and Irus. In the latter bare fists are used; but otherwise the conditions of the two fights are precisely similar. These conditions, which seem never to have altered during the long history of Greek boxing, determined the whole history of the sport, and are largely responsible for the differences which distinguish Greek boxing from modern.
In the first place, there was no regular ring, beyond what was formed by the spectators. Greek boxers had ample space and there was therefore no opportunity for cornering an opponent. The only reference to any such thing is in Theocritus’ account of the fight between Polydeuces and Amycus, where the Greeks were afraid for the moment lest “the giant’s weight might crush their champion in a narrow place.”[[716]] The narrowness of the place is evidently noted here as something unusual. The scene of the fight is the wooded dell at the foot of a lofty cliff where Amycus makes his abode and waits to waylay strangers. A fitting place for a robber but very different from the open ground where sports were wont to be held, and where brute strength could have no chance against the trained skill of the boxer. It was only the “narrow place” which gave the bully a momentary advantage, and the passage, therefore, really confirms the view that the boxing ring was wide and open. These conditions tend to discourage close fighting and to encourage defensive and waiting tactics.
Other circumstances contributed to the same result. There were no rounds in Greek boxing. The opponents fought to a finish. It might happen that both were too exhausted and by mutual consent paused to take breath; but usually the fight went on until one of the two was incapable of fighting any more, or acknowledged himself defeated (ἀπειπεῖν) by holding up his hand. This signal of defeat is often depicted on vase paintings. A good example of it occurs on the amphora in the British Museum, reproduced in Fig. [141]. In such fights forcing tactics do not pay, the boxer who makes the pace too fast exhausts himself to no purpose; in the descriptions of fights which we possess it is usually the clumsy, untrained boxer who forces the pace and tries to rush his opponent, with disastrous effects to himself. Caution was therefore the rule of the Greek boxer; and the fighting was therefore usually slow. We shall see to what absurd lengths this caution was carried in later times.
