[2163] See supra, pp. 295–6.
[2164] B. C. H. XXIII, 1899, p. 455. Furtwaengler, Bronz. v. Ol., pp. 10 f., has shown that it was a favorite device to represent boxers and pancratiasts with a sombre look (“der finstere Blick”).
[2165] 1102:κοὐδεὶς τροπαῖ’ ἔστησε τῶν ἐμῶν χερῶν.
[2166] In the passage already cited from de Alex. Magn. fort. aut virtute, Orat. II, 2, (= p. 385c); ... καὶ τῶν ὀμμάτων τὴν διάχυσιν καὶ ὑγρότητα, κ. τ. λ.; cf. also his Vita Alex. Magni, IV (= p. 666), ... τὴν ὑγρότητα τῶν ὀμμάτων.
[2167] The hair of the head from Sparta, like that of the Agias and the Philandridas, has not the expression displayed in some Lysippan heads (notably in portraits of Alexander), nor the detail which we should expect from Pliny’s statement that Lysippos excelled in his treatment of hair (H. N., XXXIV, 65; see next note). But the Agias and the Philandridas represent pancratiasts, and here we should not expect such expression. In the Agias, the hair, even if lacking in detail, is treated carefully and with variety.
[2168] H. N., XXXIV, 65: propriae huius videntur esse argutiae operum custoditae in minimis quoque rebus. Here the word argutiae means “subtlety,” rather than “animation,” as given in Harper’s Latin Dictionary.
[2169] I need hardly add that such an idealizing tendency should be carefully distinguished from the deification of mortals which came into prominence after the time of Alexander, but existed in Greece from the early fifth century B. C., at least. The case of heroizing the Thasian Theagenes, who won at Olympia in boxing and the pankration in Ols. 75 and 76 ( = 480 and 475 B. C.), has been discussed with similar ones in Ch. I, p. 35. But the fact that a victor wanted his statue to be more or less assimilated to the ideal type of the hero, whom he regarded as his athletic prototype and ideal, does not mean that he had any idea of looking upon himself as a god.
[2170] This would explain the simple, even sketchy, treatment of the closely cropped hair, just as in the Agias and the Philandridas. The similarly parted lips of the Sparta head are certainly more appropriate to an athlete represented as weary with his toil than to a youthful Herakles. The slightly fierce expression of the face, augmented by the already noted imperfection in the modeling of the right eyeball, recalls the γοργόν look characteristic of boxers and pancratiasts; cf. supra, p. 317, n. 2. On the threatening eyes of contestants in general, see Xenophon, Mem., III, 10, 6–8, and supra, p. 59.
The head appears to me to be that of a boy of about sixteen years; its style is too early for a victor in the boys’ pankration, as this event was not introduced at Olympia until the 145th Olympiad ( = 200 B. C.): see Paus., V, 8.11 and Ph., 13. The wrestling match for boys was introduced in 01. 37 ( = 632 B. C.): see Paus., V, 8.9, and Afr. Boys were first allowed to box in Ol. 41 ( = 616 B. C.): see Paus., ibid. (though Philostratos, 13, gives two traditions, Ols. 41 and 60).
[2171] We have record of only one statue of a victor set up in Sparta, that of the wrestler Hetoimokles, who won at the beginning of the sixth century B. C.: see Paus., III, 13.9, and cf. infra, Ch. VIII, p. 362, no. 4.