great achievements of Hellenistic artists was the redefinition of portrai-
ture. In the Classical period, Kresilas was admired for having made the
noble Pericles appear even nobler in his portrait (FIG. 5-41). But in Hel-
lenistic times sculptors sought not only to record the actual appearance
of their subjects in bronze and stone but also to capture the essence of
their personalities in likenesses that were at once accurate and moving.
One of the earliest of these, perhaps the finest of the Hellenistic
age and frequently copied in Roman times, was a bronze portrait
statue of Demosthenes (FIG. 5-87) by Polyeuktos.The original
was set up in the Athenian agora in 280BCE, 42 years after the great
orator’s death. Demosthenes was a frail man and in his youth even
suffered from a speech impediment, but he had enormous courage
and great moral conviction. A veteran of the disastrous battle against
Philip II at Chaeronea, he repeatedly tried to rally opposition to
Macedonian imperialism, both before and after Alexander’s death.
In the end, when it was clear the Macedonians would capture him,
he took his own life by drinking poison.
Polyeuktos rejected Kresilas’s and Lysippos’s notions of the pur-
pose of portraiture and did not attempt to portray a supremely con-
fident leader with a magnificent physique. His Demosthenes has an
aged and slightly stooped body. The orator clasps his hands ner-
vously in front of him as he looks downward, deep in thought. His
face is lined, his hair is receding, and his expression is one of great
sadness. Whatever physical discomfort Demosthenes felt is here
joined by an inner pain, his deep sorrow over the tragic demise of
democracy at the hands of the Macedonian conquerors.Hellenistic Art under Roman Patronage
In the opening years of the second centuryBCE, the Roman general
Flamininus defeated the Macedonian army and declared the old
poleis of Classical Greece free once again. The city-states never re-
gained their former glory, however. Greece became a Roman
province in 146BCE. When, 60 years later, Athens sided with King
Mithridates VI of Pontus (r. 120–63BCE) in his war against Rome,
the general Sulla crushed the Athenians. Thereafter, Athens retained
some of its earlier prestige as a center of culture and learning, but
politically it was just another city in the ever-expanding Roman Em-
pire. Nonetheless, Greek artists continued to be in great demand,
both to furnish the Romans with an endless stream of copies of
Classical and Hellenistic masterpieces and to create new statues à la
grecque (in the Greek style) for Roman patrons.
LAOCOÖNOne such work is the famous group (FIG. 5-88) of the
Trojan priest Laocoön and his sons, which was unearthed in Rome inHellenistic Period 1535-88Athanadoros, Hagesandros,
and Polydoros of Rhodes,Laocoön
and his sons, from Rome, Italy, early
first century ce.Marble, 7 101 – 2 high.
Musei Vaticani, Rome.
Hellenistic style lived on in Rome.
Although stylistically akin to
Pergamene sculpture, this statue of sea
serpents attacking Laocoön and his two
sons matches the account given only in
the Aeneid.1 ft.