Naked Truths by Lyons Claire L. Koloski-Ostrow Ann Olga

Author:Lyons, Claire L.,Koloski-Ostrow, Ann Olga. [ANN OLGA KOLOSKI-OSTROW AND CLAIRE L. LYONS]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
Published: 2011-08-28T16:00:00+00:00

8

NAKED AND LIMBLESS

Learning about the feminine body in ancient Athens

Joan Reilly

Among the sculptured images of children that appear on Athenian grave monuments during the Classical period there are scenes of a young or adolescent girl who holds a small figure of a female that has been called a “doll.” This image first appeared in Athens in the late fifth or early fourth century BCE and continued throughout the fourth century until the sumptuary legislation of Demetrios of Phaleron effectively ended sculptured grave reliefs.1 Three types of “dolls” appear on the grave reliefs; one type is a clothed and seated figure.2 Most grave reliefs, however, depict girls holding figures of naked females. There are two types of naked figures: a fully limbed figure and a truncated figure. The fully limbed one looks, to our eyes, like an ancient version of the Barbie doll (Fig. 32); it appears on only three grave reliefs.3 The truncated figure is shown more frequently; the legs are cut off above the knees and the arms above the elbows, leaving little more than a torso or trunk with a head (Fig. 33).4 The reliefs that depict these naked figures are the focus of this paper.

The grave reliefs that carry this image have been the object of description, study, and comment for many years.5 In 1909 Kastriotes made the first iconographic study of the type; he identified seven reliefs that carried the scene of a girl holding a “doll.”6 The reliefs were restudied in 1988 by Cavalier, who identified sixteen Attic reliefs that carry the image.7 The reliefs with this scene have also been discussed within the framework of investigations into the lives of children in antiquity, especially regarding their toys and games.8

Current scholarship identifies the figure depicted on the grave relief as a “doll,” that is, a toy, and compares it to a commonly found type of terracotta figure known as an articulated or jointed doll.9 The remains of these terracotta dolls have been found at a number of sanctuaries and shrines, for example at Delos, at Corinth, and on the Athenian Acropolis,10 in terracotta factories,11 and in tombs.12 The earlier terracotta figures have arms attached at the shoulder and legs attached to projecting spurs at the hip or upper legs; they often wear a short chitoniskos (Fig. 34). In the fourth century BCE there is a change in the design. The arms are attached at the shoulder as earlier, but the legs are attached at the knees without the projecting spur and the figure is now nude (Fig. 35). Many of these figures hold krotala (castanets) or cymbals and, accordingly, they have been interpreted as dancers.13

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