untitled

(coco) #1

personified figure is made recognizable by something other than an inscription
(Stafford 2000:147–71; cf. Stafford 2005d).


Late Classical and Hellenistic Personification:
The Fourth Century and After

The range of figures found in literature and art expands still further in the fourth and
third centuries. Orators make particular use of personification to embellish their
points – as Aeschines cites ‘‘the great goddess’’ Rumor as a witness to the iniquities
of Timarchus (Against Timarchus1.28–30) – and the technique becomes a standard
of later rhetorical handbooks (see Stafford 2000:5–8). In the everyday world of
New Comedy the gods in general have a lower profile than on the classical stage,
but we find Ignorance, Fortune, and Proof speaking the prologues of Menander’s
Rape of the Locks, theShield, and another play. Third-century poetry is less innovative
with its personifications, but rather elaborates on figures found earlier – as Callima-
chus addresses an entire hymn to the island of Delos, Apollo’s birthplace, who
had had just a small speaking part in the archaicHomeric Hymn to Apollo(lines
50–88). Personified places are also used in fourth-century south Italian vase-painting
to indicate the location of a scene – as Nemea watches Heracles wrestling with
the lion – alongside a selection of personified natural phenomena and yet more
abstract ideas, such as Force, Folly, Madness, Frenzy, Envy, and Punishment.
At Athens, meanwhile, in addition to votive reliefs the fourth century is notable for
a category of ‘‘document reliefs,’’ stelae with inscriptions recording decrees of the
Athenian Council and Assembly accompanied by images of such figures as The
People, The Council, Democracy, Discipline, and Victory (see A.C. Smith 1997).
All of these may of course be no more substantial in status than the rhetorical devices
of literature, but they do once again contribute to making the figures generally
familiar.
A particular feature of fourth-century cult is the introduction of a number of
political personifications. Representing political entities and concepts in human
form is of course far from being a new idea – we have already noted Victory, Justice,
Lawfulness, and Peace in archaic literature and art (and see A.C. Smith 1999 on early
classical developments) – but the fourth century sees a great expansion in the number
of concepts and their prominence. There is room here for only the briefest of
overviews of the phenomenon, but The ́riault (1996) shows how rewarding a closer
study of an individual cult can be. Concord (Homonoia) is first definitely attested as a
goddess in the 330s BC, in the ‘‘Decree on Concord’’ from Mytilene (SEG36.750),
where she is mentioned alongside Zeus of Concord and Justice as receiving public
prayers. At around the same date Concord makes her only appearance in extant vase-
painting, on an Apulian pelike attributed to the Darius Painter (Malibu 86.AE.23), in
a scene where Kassiopeia seems to be begging her daughter Andromeda’s forgiveness.
Also contemporary are the earliest coins to feature a female figure inscribed OMO-
NOIA, struck by the Greek city of Kimissa in Sicily, the reverse showing an altar with
flames on top, which has been reasonably interpreted as a sign of Concord’s cult
status. From these beginnings, The ́riault demonstrates how the cult of Concord


Ogden / Companion to Greek Religion 1405120541_4_004 Revise Proof page 81 30.10.2006 4:25pm

Personification 81
Free download pdf