Spartan Cultural Life 5 Cultural

Spartan Cultural Life

• 5 Cultural life – art: sculpture, painted vases, bone and ivory carving – architecture: Amyklaion, Menelaion, the Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia Spartan cup, around 525 BC. Clay amphora, 7 th century BC.

Early Art

Painted pottery • Laconian pottery was exported throughout the Mediterranean and was probably produced by the perioeci. • The design of this pottery reached its peak during the second quarter of the 6 th century BC. Decorations included themes of hunting, horseriding, religious rituals, banqueting, plants and animals.

www. sikyon. com/Sparta/Art/sparta_peg 06 a. html Pottery Arkesilaos, king of Kyrene in North Africa, supervises the weighting of merchandise. Spartan cup of mid sixth century BC. Bellerophon and Pegasos killing the Chimaera. Laconian cup, 570 - 565 BC.

Warrior is killing a serpent, Laconian cup, 550 BC. Hunters killing a boar, Laconian cup, 555 BC. Odysseus and his companions are forcing a pole from an olive tree into the eye of Cyclop Polyphemos, who is still eating one of their companions. Laconian kylix 550 BC, National Library of Paris.

SPARTAN CULTURAL LIFE • ART: Sculpture – Many examples of sculpture can be found at the shrines of the Spartans, such as the Amyklaion and the sanctuary of Athena Chalkioikos (Lady of the Bronze House).

Bronze Work

A bronze statuette of a soldier. Spartan work, around 500 BC.

A bronze statuette of a Spartan running girl. The maiden is running the foot-race of Heraea, leaving the hairs hanging down, while her tunic reaches a little above the knee and her right shoulder is bare, as far as the breast. Spartan work, around 520 BC. British Museum

Bone and ivory carving • • • Laconian craftsmen in bone and ivory carving could compare with the best in Greece. Ivory was imported into Sparta and was used in a variety of objects. Three Carving plaques on ivory bones from the sanctuary of Artemis Orthia in Sparta, 600 BC. Two Spartan warriors and a woman in mourning.

ARCHITECTURE: • Physical remains of architecture in Sparta are limited. • However, there are descriptions of individual buildings from the writings of the ancient historian Pausanias.

The Amyklaion • A shrine dedicated to Apollo and Hyakinthos. • Not a temple, but a throne to Apollo – excavations reveal the base of a throne and retaining wall. • Ionic style. • Carvings show lotus flowers and other sculptures. • Sparta spent many resources and expense on building the throne, indicating the piety in which they held this god. https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=HVXzrz. I 4 -ks

The Amyklaion • • From the Archaic until the Roman period - political and religious centre of Sparta. The most important Spartan festival, the Hyakinthia, took place at Amyklaion, The Acropolis of Amyklai and the Temenos of the Sanctuary of Apollo and Hyakinthos. Preserved at the site are the retaining wall, circuit walls and traces of foundations dating to various periods, and a circular altar. The Throne of Apollo Amyklaios. Stoa-like building or altar, which surrounded on three sides the colossal column-shaped bronze statue of the god. Decorated with relief representations The tomb-altar of the local god or hero Hyakinthos was used as the pedestal of the statue.

The Menelaion • A shrine to Helen and Menelaus. • Overlooks Mount Taygetus and the Eurotas Valley. • It had a square step-pyramidal structure in the style of a hero shrine. • Little remains of the shrine.

https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=P 2 rp. Us. DD 4 xg

The Menelaion • The most dramatic part = rectangular foundation that was a heroon (shrine to a hero) - Menelaus, the King of Sparta. • 8 century BC - five centuries after the presumed date of the Trojan War. • Numerous lead placards have been found there, many of them dedicated to Menelaus – evidence of what it was

Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia • Situated close to the Eurotas River. • Had a temple close to an altar 14 metres away. • Was the site of a festival held in Artemis Orthia’s honour.

Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia • Early temple - the ninth century BC • Famous for the scene of one of the Spartan initiation ceremonies in which boys and young men were flogged until they bled. • Indeed according to later traditions, the goddess demanded blood, and young men had to be flogged until the blood flowed. https: //www. youtube. com/watch? v=Filt 2 dxc. B 6 E

Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia • The temple in the centre and the altar in front of it where the floggings took place, at the bottom right corner. • On the left are the foundations of the seats of theatrical arrangements of the Roman period.

Sanctuary of Artemis Orthia The small lead figurines shown here over-sized, are crude and massproduced, but give some idea of the liveliness of artistic work at Sparta in the seventh and sixth centuries BC.