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The Caputi Hydria
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 September 2015
Extract
Since its publication in 1876, the scene on the shoulder of this vase has been interpreted as showing the activities of a vase-painters' workshop. The original drawing had been reproduced several times, but its inaccuracies were so numerous that the photographs were long overdue in spite of Beazley's useful notes on it in Potter and Painter.
The scene shows Athena and two Nikai crowning the artists for their skill. In the centre, Athena (plate VII 1), spear in hand, approaches with a wreath to crown the youth who is engaged in decorating a huge kantharos; before him waits a similar vessel with an oinochoe standing inside it. To the left, a boy who is decorating a volute-krater looks round in surprise at the Nike as she places a wreath about his head (plate VI 2). To the right of Athena another boy decorates a calyx-krater and does not notice the Nike who is about to crown him also. To the extreme right, a young girl on a dais begins the decoration of another volute-krater (plate VII 2).
This note is an attempt to show that the scene does not depict vase-painters at work, but rather the decorators of metal vessels.
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- Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1961
References
1 The vase was formerly in the Caputi Collection at Ruvo (no. 278); it passed into the collection of the Marchese De Luca Resta in Rome, then to Scaretti (Rome), and is now in the Torno Collection in Milan. It is by the Leningrad, painter, ARV 376, 61.Google ScholarAnnali 1876, pl. D–E, whence F.R. ii 307, Richter, Craft, 71Google Scholar, ML 28, 110, and Cloché, , Classes, pl. 21, 1.Google Scholar A photograph of the scene appears in the History of Technology ii, pl. 16, and Richter, , Greek Art, 307.Google Scholar It is described and discussed in Potter and Painter 11 ff. (= Proceedings of the British Academy xxx (1944) 93 ff.). I am greatly indebted to Professors C. M. Robertson, A. D. Trendall, and T. B. L. Webster for their helpful criticism and suggestions.
2 As Beazley noted, the line that in the drawing runs from the foot of the kantharos to the lap of the artist does not appear in the original. In the drawing the artist's brush is not clearly distinguished, and the handle supports are missing from the kantharos on the floor.
3 Joffroy, , Le Trésor de Vix, pl. 7Google Scholar and pl. 23. 1.
4 We now have another (Shape III) oinochoe by Myson: Athens, Agora P 25965, another commonplace vase. (Hesperia xxvii (1958) 158, pl. 45d.)
5 Cf. Euripides, , Troades, 820 ff.Google Scholar where Ganymede serves Zeus with golden oinochoai. For an illustrated discussion of gods using oinochoe and phiale see Simon, Opfernde Götter.
6 E 140; ARV 301, 3; CV pl. 28, 2; Lane, pl. 69 B.
7 For reeded Shape I oinochoai dated about 400 B.C. or a little later, see Ferrara T 814, Aurigemma,1 p. 126, 2 p. 119; Rhodes 13091, Clara Rhodos iv 252; and London 64. 10–7. 1658.
8 ARV Murray, WAV pl. 21b.Google Scholar
9 The oinochoe on the Berlin amphora is of an earlier type than those on the Castle Ashby stamnos. It is the fuller rounder style of the archaic period with a deeper ‘cut’ in the centre of the mouth. The handle is, if anything, more fancy. The other two are later in style and closer to the shape of vase decorated by the Berlin Painter, though not the same. The oinochoe on BSR xi pl. 8. 1 has a wash in dilute glaze, whereas the one on pl. 8. 4 has not; otherwise they are very like each other. Compared with the oinochoe on our hydria we see the same narrowness in the neck, and the same shallow spreading lip, both at the front and the back.
10 The kantharos on the Amasis amphora (Lane, pl. 42) perhaps gives some idea of the decoration which will result from the boy's work.
11 Indeed the calyx-krater is probably the potters' invention.
12 For these cf. Gray, D. H. F., JHS lxxiv (1954) 4Google Scholar, and n. 21. Pliny, , Nat. Hist, xxxiii 64–5Google Scholar, 100, and 123.
13 This note was written before the appearance of MrNoble, 's article ‘The Technique of Attic Vase-Painting’, AJA 64, 1960, 307–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar He illustrates this vase on pl. 84 as showing vase-painters at work. Even if my argument is sound, it will not invalidate his general thesis.
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