Image and Myth by Giuliani Luca; O'Donnell Joe;

Author:Giuliani, Luca; O'Donnell, Joe; [Giuliani, Luca]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Published: 2013-05-27T16:00:00+00:00

41. Peloponnesian shield-band relief, 570-560. Olympia, Museum, Inv. B 8364.

A very different way of depicting the episode can be seen on a tripod pyxis in Berlin.104 Here we see Priam lying murdered on the altar and Neoptolemos calmly proceeding to his next atrocity. He has seized Astyanax with his right hand and swung his body back in order to dash him to the ground. The depiction deviates from the epic insofar as the murder of Astyanax is not portrayed as taking place on the city walls but in the interior of the palace on the altar of Zeus Herkeios, where the dead Priam lies. In a sense this association is an obvious one because both scenes feature Neoptolemos as the murderous protagonist; we see the Achaean murdering the grandfather and the grandson and by association annihilating the entire Trojan royal family.

By connecting these two episodes painters were able to even further enhance the tension of the scene. One way of achieving this involved simply reversing the sequence of the killings, so that the old king had to watch Neoptolemos murdering his grandson. On a belly amphora in Berlin attributed to Lydos (fig. 42)105 Priam sits on the altar reaching his hand out beseechingly to touch the chin of Neoptolemos, who is striding towards him. Two Trojan women stand behind the king. The first is stretching out her arms and thus echoing Priam’s gesture; the second has raised one hand to tear at her hair and is touching Priam with the other. Neoptolomus is holding the terrified, struggling Astyanax in his lowered right hand but has already drawn back his arm in order to kill the boy by dashing him on the ground. The painting emphasizes the close eye contact between the two main protagonists. The king has bent his head slightly forward as if to add force to his entreaty, while Neoptolemos has raised his head slightly and is looking Priam directly in the eyes—although this does not seem to be weakening his obvious intent to murder the king’s grandson. The image thus underscores the mercilessness of Neoptolemos, although there is nothing to indicate a direct threat to Priam. Of course the informed beholder knows that Neoptolemos is going to murder both Astyanax and Priam, but this second murder is not an explicit theme of the painting.106

Finally, there was a further possibility that the painters could exploit to heighten the iconography’s dramatic effect, which involved the fusion of two familiar and closely related iconographic templates. One showed Neoptolemos holding a spear or sword in his raised right hand about to slay Priam. The other featured the same warrior preparing to dash Astyanax to the ground before Priam’s eyes. The position of the figure was the same in both cases. All that the painter needed to do was replace the raised weapon with the body of Astyanax, thus fusing the two murders in a single event that is characterized above all by its extreme barbarity. It is this strategy we see at work on the London amphora (fig.

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