Wandering Maidens in the Akropolis Propylaia: Some Considerations on the Spatial Setting of the Cults of the Charites, Artemis, and Hermes, Their Administration and Related Cult Images

Graml, Constanze (2022): Wandering Maidens in the Akropolis Propylaia: Some Considerations on the Spatial Setting of the Cults of the Charites, Artemis, and Hermes, Their Administration and Related Cult Images. In: Journal of Hellenic Studies, Bd. 142: S. 274-297

Abstract

This paper aims to develop a holistic view on the cults of the Charites, Artemis and Hermes which can plausibly be located in the Acropolis Propylaia. Based on the combined analysis of the spatial and architectural setting, which changed in the course of the erection of the Mnesiklean Propylaia in 437–432 BC, along with the imagery and textual evidence for these cults, I propose that due to the altered spatial distribution and the rotated building axes, initially separate cults were fused together. Consequently, iconographical shifts occur in the modes of depiction of these three divinities. The Charites, who were attached in Archaic imagery to Hermes, in the Classical period become iconographically intertwined with Artemis. The iconographic shift is detectable especially in the new cult images1 for Hermes Propylaios and Artemis Epipyrgidia with the Charites, which had been created by the sculptor Alkamenes, presumably by order of the Athenian state. This article should not be seen as a contribution to the analysis of copies (Kopienkritik) for known statue types or an architectural study; instead, its focus lies in the concepts of visualization of divine images, which were developed for a highly specific spatial setting in the cultic landscape of the Athenian Acropolis.

• Dokumententyp: Zeitschriftenartikel
• Keywords: Acropolis at Athens; Propylaia; cult topography; Greek iconography; Greek epigraphy
• Fakultät: Kulturwissenschaften > Department für Kulturwissenschaften und Altertumskunde
• Themengebiete: 900 Geschichte und Geografie > 900 Geschichte
• ISSN: 2041-4099
• Bemerkung: Published online by Cambridge University Press: 03 March 2023
• Sprache: Englisch