TRAVEL DIARIES: AMPHIPOLIS IN 2000

THE BATTLE OF AMPHIPOLIS IN THUCYDIDES’ HISTORY

Attic black figure hydria (560 BCE) Louvre

 









 

On the road to Amphipolis: The Rodopi Mountains are the frontier of Greece with Bulgaria

AMPHIPOLIS, OR, THE TRAGEDY OF CLEON OF ATHENS

Oh Muse! I sing of the tragic end of Cleon of Athens. Help me conjure his dubious image. There are no statues of Cleon, no busts, no sculptures, by which we could recall his looks. All we have is his actions in the distant time of the Peloponnesian Wars in Greece, in the fifth century BCE. He is, of course, well known to the Classicists and the Philologists, as he plays a central role in Thucydides’ history of the Peloponnesian Wars. Yet there are no biographies of Cleon, and even the article about him in Wikipedia has scarce information. I will mention a few facts about his life below, but I want to ask a different question first, one that pertains to my use of the word ‘tragedy’ in reference to Cleon, leaving aside, for the moment, the details of his life. What is his tragedy? Many would quibble with me about using the word ‘tragedy’ with regards to Cleon. But let us think of Cleon as a tragic figure for a moment. Why would it be tragic? Let’s start with why it would not be. It would not be because of his stature in the society. He is no King, rather a man of the people, a cunning man from the lowest classes of Athens. It would not be because of his death at Amphipolis, and the strategic mistake he made that led to it. What could be worse than the conditions of his own life? It must be because of the way we know him, through the account of the historian Thucydides. Thucydides hated Cleon. Despite the enormous efforts at objectivity that Thucydides makes in his History of the Peloponnesian War, despite the objectivity that has gained him the title of first great historian from the Academy and professionals of History, together with the less objective Herodotus, despite such legendary objectivity, Thucydides cannot manage to hide his deep dislike for Cleon. 

“Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, . . . the most violent man in Athens, and at that time by far the most powerful with The People, came forward . . . .” (3.36.6)\

First of all, Cleon was a man of the Athenian working class. Cleon's father Cleaenetus may have been a leather merchant and tanner. An inscription lists him as a choregos, i.e., producer of stage performances. Using the money and the goodwill he had inherited from his father, Cleon started a remarkable political career as a radical democrat, claiming to be deeper in love with the people's Assembly than with his friends. Thucydides was an aristocrat and an admiral of the Athenian navy, a Periclean, one who stood by the policies and theories of Pericles. Pericles, an aristocrat himself, but one who fashioned himself as a friend of the people and an enemy of the oligarchs, died shortly after the war began. He had been very cunning in the ways of obtaining the goals of Athens without going into all out war with Sparta. The death of Pericles had resulted in the growth of the influence of the more democratic parties, which were eager for all out war with Sparta.

Hoplites running

In this surge of aggressively patriotic fervor, Cleon rode the wave. He became the commander in the Athenian siege of the island of Sphacteria in 425 BCE, which had a glorious and triumphant result for Athens. Many Spartan soldiers surrendered to the Athenians and were taken prisoner, an event thought to be unprecedented, as the Spartan soldiers were reputed to be fighters to the death. This made Cleon the most admired leader in the Athenian assembly, and so he was designated commander of the expedition to re-take the city of Amphipolis, which controlled the gold and silver mines of the north of Greece. And there, due to his own mistake, Cleon would meet his death in 422 BCE, and cause the total defeat of the Athenian armies in Thrace.

The ruined walls of Amphipolis

The Battle of Amphipolis (422 BCE)

 

The sections of Thucydides (below) that I consider crucial to an understanding of the “tragedy” of Cleon, as I have outlined it above, are highlighted. This makes it easier to go through the main events of the battle, as well. Those of you who want to feel the cadence of Thucydides’ prose and how it makes his argument should read all of the text. And note the wonderful speech of Brasidas to the Spartans (at 5.9 below) where he lays bare the intelligent strategy that would win him the day, and his idealism for the freedom of the Spartans and their mission to liberate the other cities of Hellas from the Athenian Empire. Brasidas died in the battle, but the Spartans were victorious over the Athenians, and Cleon died too.

Bust of Thucydides (431 B.C.E)

Map of the Northern Aegean:

(click on maps to expand their size)

The city of Amphipolis is located east of the Chalcidic Peninsula in what has been known as Thrace (Thraki) since ancient times.

Map of Ancient Chalkidiki (Chalcidic Peninsula)

Diagram of the ancient city of Amphipolis on the shores of the Strymon river

The Setting

Idealized picture of Amphipolis, drawing by Cousinery, 1831

View towards the North from the Acropolis of Amphipolis: Ancient wall in the foreground (click on photo to expand its size)

THUCYDIDES, HISTORY OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR
[Translated by Richard Crawley]
Book V. Chapter XV




Tenth Year of the War - Death of Cleon and Brasidas 

5.2. “Meanwhile Cleon prevailed on the Athenians to let him set sail at the expiration of the armistice for the towns in the direction of Thrace with twelve hundred heavy infantry and three hundred horse from Athens, a large force of the allies, and thirty ships.

[Thucydides describes the Athenian capture of the town of Torone under Cleon’s leadership. Brasidas, the Spartan general (strategos) moved his troops towards Torone to help lift the siege, but arrives too late and turns back. Torone was a port located at the very tip of the middle Sithonian prong of the Chalcidic Peninsula, once known as Cape Dehrris (see maps above).]

5.3.6. Meanwhile Cleon, after placing a garrison in Torone, weighed anchor and sailed around Athos on his way to Amphipolis.

. . . . . . . . . .

View towards the Aegean, with the Strymon river winding its way to the coast. The port of Eion in the misty distance, and the estuary of the Strymon river seen from the Acropolis of Amphipolis

5.6. Cleon, whom we left on his voyage from Torone to Amphipolis, made Eion his base, and after an unsuccessful assault upon the Andrian colony of Stagirus, took Galepsus, a colony of Thasos, by storm. He now sent envoys to Perdiccas [King of Macedonia] to command his attendance with an army, as provided by the alliance; and others to Thrace, to Polles, king of the Odomantians, who was to bring as many Thracian mercenaries as possible; and himself remained inactive in Eion, awaiting their arrival. Informed of this, Brasidas on his part took up a position of observation upon Cerdylium, a place situated in the Argilian country on high ground across the river, not far from Amphipolis, and commanding a view on all sides, and thus made it impossible for Cleon's army to move without his seeing it; for he fully expected that Cleon, despising the scanty numbers of his opponent, would march against Amphipolis with the force that he had got with him.

The hill at Cerdylium, from the Acropolis of Amphipolis where Brasidas camped with some of the Spartan forces

5.6.4. At the same time Brasidas made his preparations, calling to his standard fifteen hundred Thracian mercenaries and all the Edonians, horse and targeteers; he also had a thousand Myrcinian and Chalcidian targeteers, besides those in Amphipolis, and a force of heavy infantry numbering altogether about two thousand, and three hundred Hellenic horse. Fifteen hundred of these he had with him upon Cerdylium; the rest were stationed with Clearidas in Amphipolis.

Foundations of south wall at Acropolis of Amphipolis with a view towards the port of Eion

5.7. After remaining quiet for some time, Cleon was at length obliged to do as Brasidas expected. His soldiers, tired of their inactivity, began also seriously to reflect on the weakness and incompetence of their commander, and the skill and valor that would be opposed to him, and on their own original unwillingness to accompany him. These murmurs coming to the ears of Cleon, he resolved not to disgust the army by keeping it in the same place, and broke up his camp and advanced.

The road to the Acropolis of Amphipolis, with Cerdylium in the distance

5.7.3. The temper of the general [Cleon] was what it had been at Pylos, his success on that occasion having given him confidence in his capacity. He never dreamed of any one coming out to fight him, but said that he was rather going up to view the place; and if he waited for his reinforcements, it was not in order to make victory secure in case he should be compelled to engage, but to be enabled to surround and storm the city. He accordingly came and posted his army upon a strong hill in front of Amphipolis, and proceeded to examine the lake formed by the Strymon, and how the town lay on the side of Thrace.

Cleon’s hill, across the Strymon, where the Athenian army decamped prior to its failed attempt to retreat to Eion, seen from the Acropolis of Amphipolis

5.7.5.He thought to retire at pleasure without fighting, as there was no one to be seen upon the wall or coming out of the gates, all of which were shut. Indeed, it seemed a mistake not to have brought down engines with him; he could then have taken the town, there being no one to defend it.
 

5.8.As soon as Brasidas saw the Athenians in motion he descended himself from Cerdylium and entered Amphipolis. He did not venture to go out in regular order against the Athenians: he mistrusted his strength, and thought it inadequate to the attempt; not in numbers- these were not so unequal- but in quality, the flower of the Athenian army being in the field, with the best of the Lemnians and Imbrians. He therefore prepared to assail them by stratagem.

5.8.3.By showing the enemy the number of his troops, and the shifts which he had been put to arm them, he thought that he should have less chance of beating him than by not letting him have a sight of them, and thus learn how good a right he had to despise them. He accordingly picked out a hundred and fifty heavy infantry and, putting the rest under Clearidas, determined to attack suddenly before the Athenians retired; thinking that he should not have again such a chance of catching them alone, if their reinforcements were once allowed to come up; and so calling all his soldiers together in order to encourage them and explain his intention, spoke as follows:

Ruins of the theater in the Acropolis of Amphipolis where Brasidas probably delivered his speech to the Lacedaemonians

Speech of Brasidas to the Lacedaemonians:

5.9."Peloponnesians, the character of the country from which we have come, one which has always owed its freedom to valor, and the fact that you are Dorians and the enemy you are about to fight Ionians, whom you are accustomed to beat, are things that do not need further comment. But the plan of attack that I propose to pursue, this it is as well to explain, in order that the fact of our adventuring with a part instead of with the whole of our forces may not damp your courage by the apparent disadvantage at which it places you. I imagine it is the poor opinion that he has of us, and the fact that he has no idea of any one coming out to engage him, that has made the enemy march up to the place and carelessly look about him as he is doing, without noticing us. But the most successful soldier will always be the man who most happily detects a blunder like this, and who carefully consulting his own means makes his attack not so much by open and regular approaches, as by seizing the opportunity of the moment; and these stratagems, which do the greatest service to our friends by most completely deceiving our enemies, have the most brilliant name in war. Therefore, while their careless confidence continues, and they are still thinking, as in my judgment they are now doing, more of retreat than of maintaining their position, while their spirit is slack and not high-strung with expectation, I with the men under my command will, if possible, take them by surprise and fall with a run upon their center; and do you, Clearidas, afterwards, when you see me already upon them, and, as is likely, dealing terror among them, take with you the Amphipolitans, and the rest of the allies, and suddenly open the gates and dash at them, and hasten to engage as quickly as you can. That is our best chance of establishing a panic among them, as a fresh assailant has always more terrors for an enemy than the one he is immediately engaged with. Show yourself a brave man, as a Spartan should; and do you, allies, follow him like men, and remember that zeal, honor, and obedience mark the good soldier, and that this day will make you either free men and allies of Lacedaemon, or slaves of Athens; even if you escape without personal loss of liberty or life, your bondage will be on harsher terms than before, and you will also hinder the liberation of the rest of the Hellenes. No cowardice then on your part, seeing the greatness of the issues at stake, and I will show that what I preach to others I can practice myself."

5.10. After this brief speech Brasidas himself prepared for the sally, and placed the rest with Clearidas at the Thracian gates to support him as had been agreed. Meanwhile he had been seen coming down from Cerdylium and then in the city, which is overlooked from the outside, sacrificing near the temple of Athene; in short, all his movements had been observed, and word was brought to Cleon, who had at the moment gone on to look about him, that the whole of the enemy's force could be seen in the town, and that the feet of horses and men in great numbers were visible under the gates, as if a sally were intended. Upon hearing this he went up to look, and having done so, being unwilling to venture upon the decisive step of a battle before his reinforcements came up, and fancying that he would have time to retire, bid the retreat be sounded and sent orders to the men to effect it by moving on the left wing in the direction of Eion, which was indeed the only way practicable. This however not being quick enough for him, he joined the retreat in person and made the right wing wheel round, thus turning its unarmed side to the enemy.

The path of Cleon’s retreat under the walls of Amphipolis East of the city walls. The exposed right side of the Athenian troop formations faced the city walls. The hoplite carried the shield in his left arm.

5.10.5. It was then that Brasidas, seeing the Athenian force in motion and his opportunity come, said to the men with him and the rest: "Those fellows will never stand before us, one can see that by the way their spears and heads are going. Troops which do as they do seldom stand a charge. Quick, someone, and open the gates I spoke of, and let us be out and at them with no fears for the result." [6] Accordingly issuing out by the palisade gate and by the first in the long wall then existing, he ran at the top of his speed along the straight road, where the trophy now stands as you go by the steepest part of the hill, and fell upon and routed the centre of the Athenians, panic-stricken by their own disorder and astounded at his audacity. [7] At the same moment Clearidas in execution of his orders issued out from the Thracian gates to support him, and also attacked the enemy. [8] The result was that the Athenians, suddenly and unexpectedly attacked on both sides, fell into confusion; and their left towards Eion, which had already got on some distance, at once broke and fled. Just as it was in full retreat and Brasidas was passing on to attack the right, he received a wound; but his fall was not perceived by the Athenians, as he was taken up by those near him and carried off the field.

5.10.9.. The Athenian right made a better stand, and though Cleon, who from the first had no thought of fighting, at once fled and was overtaken and slain by a Myrcinian targeteer, his infantry forming in close order upon the hill twice or thrice repulsed the attacks of Clearidas, and did not finally give way until they were surrounded and routed by the missiles of the Myrcinian and Chalcidian horse and the targeteers. [10] Thus the Athenian army was all now in flight; and such as escaped being killed in the battle, or by the Chalcidian horse and the targeteers, dispersed among the hills, and with difficulty made their way to Eion.

The direction of the Athenians’ retreat, towards the port of Eion

5.10.11. The men who had taken up and rescued Brasidas, brought him into the town with the breath still in him: he lived to hear of the victory of his troops, and not long after expired. [12] The rest of the army returning with Clearidas from the pursuit stripped the dead and set up a trophy.

5.12. After this all the allies attended in arms and buried Brasidas at the public expense in the city, in front of what is now the marketplace, and the Amphipolitans, having enclosed his tomb, ever afterwards sacrifice to him as a hero and have given to him the honour of games and annual offerings. They constituted him the founder of their colony, and pulled down the Hagnonic erections, and obliterated everything that could be interpreted as a memorial of his having founded the place; for they considered that Brasidas had been their preserver, and courting as they did the alliance of Lacedaemon for fear of Athens, in their present hostile relations with the latter they could no longer with the same advantage or satisfaction pay Hagnon his honors. [2] They also gave the Athenians back their dead. About six hundred of the latter had fallen and only seven of the enemy, owing to there having been no regular engagement, but the affair of accident and panic that I have described. After taking up their dead the Athenians sailed off home, while Clearidas and his troops remained to arrange matters at Amphipolis.”

Dying hoplite, from the pediment of the Temple of Athena in Aegina

Thucydides’ account of the battle of Amphipolis ends in a eulogy of Brasidas, and there are no good words for the dead Athenian commander. Thucydides’ dislike of Cleon, ‘the most violent man in Athens’ and darling of The People, - of the mob-, is reinforced in the account of the Battle of Amphipolis by his description of Cleon’s error in exposing the right flank of the retreating Athenians, and the basic error of the retreat itself. Thucydides buried Cleon for history. That is Cleon’s tragedy: to be known, for centuries after death, but to be known badly.

TRAGIC ART: THE TREASURE HOUSE OF THE SIPHNIANS

THE TRAGIC IN MARBLE: ARCHAIC PEDIMENT AND FRIEZE SCULPTURES FROM THE TREASURE HOUSE OF SIPHNOS AT DELPHI


ART IN THE TRAGIC AGE OF THE GREEKS





"The Greek Spirit is the plastic artist, forming the stone into a work of art." (Hegel, Philosophy of History)















Hera stoops to finish off a fallen giant.


[click on images to expand their size]



The Siphnian Treasury was a building dedicated to the Greek city (polis) of Delphi by the city-state of Siphnos, located in the island of that name, of which a view below. This island, now known as Sifnos, is one of the Cyclades, lying between Serifos and Paros, and north of Milos, about 80 nautical miles from the port of Athens. In ancient times, the people of Siphnos had gained enormous wealth from their silver and gold mines, as Herodotus records in his Histories, and they vaunted their wealth in the construction of their treasury in Delphi, the first religious structure in that holy site that was made entirely out of marble.













Sifnos today








 

“The Samians who had fought against Polycrates, when they knew that the Lacedaemonians were about to forsake them, left Samos themselves, and sailed to Siphnos. They happened to be in want of money; and the Siphnians at that time were at the height of their greatness, no islanders having so much wealth as they. There were mines of gold and silver in their country, and of so rich a yield, that from a tithe of the ores the Siphnians furnished out a treasury at Delphi which was on a par with the grandest there. What the mines yielded was divided year by year among the citizens.”
[Herodotos, Histories, III.57]


But the Treasure House was not just the branch of a Siphnian bank in Delphi. It was a dedication to the god Apollo, and therefore it was itself a holy site, a religious building designed to house the offerings of the Siphnians, and as such a temple, with all the outward characteristics of a temple, including its artful sculptural adornments.

As a practical matter, however, the building was used to house many lavish gifts given to the priests to be offered to Apollo, among other gods and goddesses. Pausanias also confirms that the treasury was built from one-tenth of the proceeds of the gold mines of the island and its purpose was to impress the other Greeks with its splendor, as it was not meant to commemorate any victory or other important event in the history of Siphnos.


 [“The Siphnians also built a Treasure House, and this is why: the island of Siphnos yielded gold-mines, and the god commanded them to bring a tithe of the produce to Delphi, so they built a treasure-house and brought the tithe. When out of insatiable greed they gave up this tribute, the sea flooded in and obliterated the mines.” Pausanias, Guide to Greece: Phokis. XI, 2]























Delphi: The Sacred Way at Delphi, downhill towards the West





 

In Delphi, the Treasure House of the Siphnians was located at the “crossroads of the treasuries,” where the Sacred Way turns abruptly and ascends the mountain towards the east. In the map below (click on the image to expand its size) the remaining foundations of the Siphnian treasury are marked as number 13, in the bottom left center of the image. The Sacred Way originates at the gate located in the extreme right bottom corner of the map and moves towards the west, turning abruptly, a few feet north of the Siphnian treasury, in its ascent up the hill towards the east.
































In time, the Treasure House fell into disrepair and was buried. The ruined foundations of the building were uncovered sometime between 1903 and 1906, during the excavation of the Delphi site, and the friezes and pedimental sculpture of the treasury were discovered at that time. These are now housed at the Delphi Archaelogical Museum.

The treasury building is built in two parts; a pronaos, or porch, and a cella, or enclosure. The pronaos is distyle-in-antis, which means that the side walls extend to the front of the porch, and the pediment is supported by two caryatids in the form of Korai (maidens), instead of plain pilasters. Below the pediment runs a continuous frieze, which is described below.

The eastern pediment of the treasury shows the story of Hercules stealing Apollo’s tripod, an object which was strongly associated with the god’s oracular inspirations. Not much is known of the western pediment, and nothing has remained of it. The sculptural friezes ran around the building depicting various scenes from Greek Mythology. Only a few broken pieces remain. The Southern side depicts scenes that support the East side, where the gods sit watching the Greeks raid the village of Troy. As Hegel wrote, “Homer is the element in which the Greek world lives, as man does in the air.” (Philosophy of History). The West side, only a few pieces of which remain, shows the story of the ‘Judgment of Paris,’ depicting three chariots groups (each attributed to Athena, Aphrodite and Hera). The north side displays another version of the familiar Gigantomachy. The remains of the eastern pediment and the four friezes are described in detail and illustrated below.

These fascinating remains, surviving from the treasury’s pediments and friezes, are displayed at the Museum in Delphi. They date from 525 BCE. The building was erected over a period of years, from 530 to 525 BCE. The sculptural decorations, made of Parian marble and painted with bright colors, still visible in places, represent the mature archaic style of Ancient Greek art and are believed to be the work of two groups of craftsmen, each under a sculptor with his assistant, whose names have not been preserved. The western and southern friezes are made by one sculptor and his group, showing tendencies of Ionic art. It is self-contained and static, as a painting. The other artist, who made the northern and the eastern friezes seem to have been exposed to the influence of the art of Chios. It is plastic, narrative and bears the mark of the artistic activity of Attica.























Eastern Frieze: Aeneas and Hector






ART IN THE TRAGIC AGE OF THE GREEKS

What is the religious significance of the sculptures? What is their meaning? I suggest that the question of their meaning turns on the struggles that are depicted in the sculptures, similar to those depicted in the pediments of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, in the friezes of the Parthenon in Athens, and in the great Altar of Pergamon, a recurring Hellenic theme. It is, in fact, the meaning of the god Apollo himself in ancient Greek religion: the Hellenic self-imposed imperative to dominate and control its own instinctual and animalic nature, expressed in the two phrases which were carved on the Temple of Apollo in Delphi: Meden agan (Nothing in Excess) and Gnothi se auton (Know Thyself). It is sublimation depicted in the form of battle. The giants, the beasts, the centaurs, represent the insatiability and the over-reaching which is the hubris of man. Man as beast and as debased [kakoi] without rational control. And that insatiability within man, the possibility of hubris, is that which is fearful within us. To dominate it and control it is the ultimate bid for power over our selves. The insight is Nietzsche’s:

“From scenting out ‘beautiful souls,’ ‘golden means,’ and other perfections in the Greeks, from admiring in them such things as their repose in grandeur, their ideal disposition, their sublime simplicity –from this ‘sublime simplicity,’ a niaiserie allemande [a German silliness or inanity], when all is said and done, I was preserved by the psychologist in me. I saw their strongest instinct, the will to power, I saw them trembling at the intractable force of this drive –I saw all their institutions evolve out of protective measures designed for mutual security against the explosive material within them. The tremendous internal tension then discharged itself in fearful and ruthless external hostility: the city states tore one another to pieces so that the citizen of each of them might find peace within himself. One needed to be strong: danger was close at hand –it lurked everywhere. The splendid supple physique, the reckless realism and immorality which pertains to the Hellene was a necessity, not a ‘natural quality.’ It was produced, it was not there from the beginning. And one employed festivals and arts for no other purpose than to feel oneself dominant, to show oneself dominant: they are means for making oneself feared.” [Götzen-Dämmerung, oder: Wie man mit dem Hammer philosophiert, "The Twilight of the Idols, or: How one Philosophizes with a Hammer" (Leipzig, 1889) - “What I Owe to the Ancients” 4]

The struggle of man against himself, the struggle within, has no conclusion. It continues perennially. We never overcome ourselves, for we cannot. That is the tragic fate of man.
How do these sculptures reflect this? And what is it about our traditional perception and understanding of the ancient Greeks that they do not reflect? In other words, how is Nietzsche correct?

The traditional perception of the ancient Greeks, which Nietzsche describes as a ‘niaiserie allemande,’ but which might just as well be a British or an American ‘niaiserie,’ a scholar’s silliness, is that which Winckelmann described as the ‘noble simplicity and quiet grandeur,’ (‘Edle Einfachkeit und Stille Größe.’) of ancient Greek Art, in reference to the marble sculptures of the Classical and Hellenistic periods: It is the perception conveyed by the famous instances of such Classical sculpture, such as the Apollo of the Belvedere (below), the Laocoön, or the refined aristocratic youths of Praxiteles.





























The Apollo of the Belvedere

This refined detachment and imperious aloofness are totally absent from the sculptures of the treasury of Siphnos. There is no quiet grandeur in these figures. Here, we are instead in face of a tragic drama unfolding, of a struggle that has no beginning and no end, as it is the struggle against the elemental components of our humanity. Hence the forcefulness, the raw power, of the figures and their movements in the Treasure House of the Siphnians: in the dynamic of the conflict as it unfolds in the narrative of the northern frieze, for example, or in the implicit tension of the figures in the ‘Judgment of Paris’ scene in the eastern frieze; in the ferocity of the lion’s head, with its jaws fastened on the giant’s leg; the horror of the Medusa head on the shield of Agamemnon, which stares outward, towards us, as if warning us that the conflict engulfs us too as we walk by, and thereby infuses us with the stoneniness of fear. The gods and goddesses that watch the battle on the field of Troy are tensed with jealousy, as Eris presides over the consequences of her deed, - Eris, the Fury, hovering above the banquet of the gods. Isn’t that the impression conveyed by those raised arms of the women, reaching for each other’s shoulders, holding each other down? Or the tense right arms of Apollo and Zeus?


























Eastern Frieze: Artemisa, Aphrodite, Apollo and Zeus on his throne (fragment)


 

The sculptures at Delphi belie our concept of the ancient Greeks as calm philosophers and wise statesmen, the images of Plato and of Solon, and instead show us a perpetual war to the death. This is the tragic perspective of the Greeks in the Lyrical Age, the age of Archaic Art, tragic because unavoidable.

The ancient Greeks carved themselves in marble, creating thus what they took to be an ideal and imperishable image of themselves and of the tragic fate of humanity. In his Philosophy of History, Hegel interprets the Greek Spirit as “Individuality conditioned by Beauty.” He discovers the origin of this individuality in the relationship between the Greeks and Nature:

“. . . Greek Spirit was excited to wonder at the Natural in Nature. It does not maintain the position of stupid indifference to it as something existing, and there an end of it; but regards it as something in the first instance foreign, in which, however, it has a presentiment of confidence, and the belief that it bears something within it which is friendly to the human spirit.” (Philosophy of History, Dover, 1956, at 234).

Their eagerness to know the meaning of Nature and find therein that which is “friendly” to the human spirit or, in other words, to find themselves in Nature, is reflected, according to Hegel, in “the comprehensive idea of Pan.”

“To the Greeks Pan did not represent the objective Whole, but that indefinite neutral ground which involves the element of the subjective; he embodies that thrill which pervades us in the silence of the forests; . . . (a “panic terror” is the common expression for the groundless fright).” (234-35).

In their identification with Nature, which Hegel calls “the Indefinite,” the Greeks felt that they could communicate with it, and with this understanding gained, present in Art an explanation, both of Nature and of humanity’s nature.

“In what has been stated we have, on the one hand, the Indefinite, which, however, holds communication with man; on the other hand the fact, that such communication is only a subjective imagining – an explanation furnished by the percipient himself.” (235).

“Greek freedom of thought is excited by an alien existence; but it is free because it transforms and virtually reproduces the stimulus by its own operation.” (238)

Hegel argued that it was Poesy (manteia) and Art that introduced the spiritual into the Natural among the Greeks, and thus they discovered the subjective within the body as well as in all of Nature. But the development of the Greek character, of Greek “freedom” is therefore not based on a universal morality in the form of duties based on reason or authority, but rather in a willful self-fashioning of the body’s own humors:

“In Man, the side of his subjective existence which he owes to Nature, is the Heart, the Disposition, Passion, and Variety of Temperament: this side is then developed in a spiritual direction to free Individuality; so that the character is not placed in a relation to universally valid moral authorities, assuming the form of duties, but the Moral appears as a nature peculiar to the individual –an exertion of will, the result of disposition and individual constitution.”

Which is why Hegel believes that this marks the emergence of individuality in world history. But it is individuality that only expresses itself in the form of Art. The freedom which the Greeks did not yet know in their actual social and political existence, - theirs was after all a slave-owning society-, they were nonetheless able to intuit as an element in Nature, and so they carved it in stone:














Hegel lecturing in Berlin (1820's)



 





“This stamps the Greek character as that of Individuality conditioned by Beauty, which is produced by Spirit, transforming the merely Natural into an expression of its own being. The activity of Spirit does not yet possess in itself the material and organ of expression, but needs the excitement of Nature and the matter which Nature supplies: it is not free, self-determining Spirituality, but mere naturalness formed to Spirituality –Spiritual Individuality. The Greek Spirit is the plastic artist, forming the stone into a work of art. In this formative process the stone does not remain mere stone – the form being only super-induced from without; but it is made an expression of the Spiritual, even contrary to its nature, and thus transformed. Conversely, the artist needs for his spiritual conceptions, stone, colors, sensuous forms to express his idea. Without such an element he can no more be conscious of the idea himself, than give it an objective form for the contemplation of others; since it cannot in Thought alone become an object to him. . . . In Greek Beauty the sensuous is only a sign, an expression, an envelope, in which Spirit manifests itself.” (238-39) [Emphases are all Hegel's]

Nietzsche paints a tragic portrait of the ‘psychology’ of the Greeks, emphasizing their ‘realism’ and the cleverness of their instinct for power and self-protection. Hegel, plotting the development of the idea of freedom in world history, a very different preoccupation than Nietzsche’s, concludes that the Greek spirit expressed itself fundamentally in their art, and thereby the Greeks achieved the only freedom that was possible for them in their time. My suggestion regarding the matter at hand is based on both these observations: that the stone remnants of the Treasure House of Siphnos are a representation of the spirit of the Greeks, whose interpretation of life was tragic. The tragic perception of life, which is affirmative of life and of this world, takes on the inevitability of struggle, of war, of envy and fear, as inescapable and ever-recurring aspects of human life. This perception is reflected in Greek Archaic Art as in a mirror of their self, of the self of the artist as well as that of the perceivers and worshippers. The Archaic is the truly tragic art of the Greeks, and it is visible in the friezes of the Treasure House of Siphnos.





Illustration of the Sculptures

I describe the sculptures from the Siphnian Treasury in the following order: 1) The frontal aspect of the Treasure House and its portico; 2) the east pediment, there being no remains of the west pediment, and the friezes grouped by their style, the Attic northern and eastern friezes (3 and 4), and the Ionian western and southern friezes (5 and 6).





1. The front of the Treasury




















Reconstruction of the front of the treasury shows the columns as karyatids in the form of korai (maidens). The front faced towards the West.





2. The East Pediment

The theme of the eastern pediment, the only one that has been preserved, and which was in the rear of the building, is the quarrel between Apollo and Hercules about the possession of the prophetic tripod. The tripod was where Pythia, the priestess of Apollo, sat when she delivered the oracle. When Pythia refused to provide a response to Hercules’ query, due to the latter’s having yet failed to atone for the murder of Iphitus, Hercules carried off the tripod, intending to establish an oracle of his own. In the middle of the scene, there is Artemis holding back the furious Apollo who wants to take the tripod from Hercules, the latter having shouldered it, is moving away. Standing between the two and trying to appease them is Athena (or Zeus?). The east pediment measures 19 by 2 ½ feet. There are bystanders on both sides of Apollo and Hercules, and the sculptor has not made much effort to vary their poses, so that the composition is monotonous and the figures are fitted into the field by the unhappy expedient of reducing their height away from the center. The sculptor was hampered by the existence of a back wall that reaches halfway up the pediment and required the carving of the lower parts of some of the central figures in relief, while their upper parts stand free, which is not very artful.






















East Pediment: central group. Apollo holds on to the tripod as Hercules carries it off, while Athena (or Zeus?) stands between them in an effort to appease them.












East Pediment: The struggle between Hercules and Apollo over the holy tripod





How apposite here is Nietzsche’s statement about the psychological ‘theater’ of the Greeks? “. . . [O]ne employed festivals and arts for no other purpose than to feel oneself dominant, to show oneself dominant: they are the means for making oneself feared.” The story of Apollo and Hercules’ fight over the holy tripod, represented in the eastern pediment, is a story about Hercules wanting to make himself feared so as to reverse the condemnation that hovered over him because of his un-atoned murder of Iphitus. By stealing the tripod from Delphi in order to create his own oracle, Hercules intended to proclaim his truth as the only truth. The Delphic Oracle, which was the voice of Apollo, - the truth of Apollo -, had refused him because he was adjudged guilty of murder, as a criminal. So Hercules wanted to set up a rival oracle that would absolve him, and hence marched off with the tripod. He would absolve himself. Hercules was a great hero to the Greeks.

A good question is, which god or goddess is represented as standing between Apollo and Hercules and trying to appease them? The speculation is that the figure in the center of the pediment is either Zeus (Power and Law) or Athena (Knowledge and Reason). Taking this choice as the correct one in this case, should Authority or Wisdom moderate a fight? Which would the artist have chosen? And recall that the pediment is what you see above you when you approach the temple.



3. The Northern Frieze

The northern frieze depicts the war between the Olympian gods and the Giants, the Gigantomachia. At the left end, Hephaestus in his blacksmith’s shop filling his furnace bags with air, while in front of him two goddesses are fighting with two giants. Further ahead the goddess Cybele (behind her Hercules or Dionysus at grips with a giant) in a chariot drawn by two lions which are tearing a giant to pieces.

The goddess Cybele was known among the Greeks as Μήτηρ (Mētēr "Mother") or Μήτηρ Ὀρεία ("Mountain-Mother"), or, with a particular Anatolian sacred mountain in mind, Idaea, inasmuch as she was supposed to have been born on Mount Ida in Anatolia, near Troy. In most mythology her story is Phrygian. Her Ancient Greek title, Potnia Theron, alludes to her Neolithic roots as the ‘Mistress of the Animals.’She is associated with her lion throne and her chariot drawn by lions.



















Northern Frieze: Cybele’s chariot was pulled by two lions: one of the lions is tearing a giant to pieces.




In front of Cybele’s chariot, to the right of the frieze, Apollo and Artemis (at their feet the giant Ephialtas is already dead and a little farther right the giant Astartas is just falling), are shooting with their arrows at three shielded giants and the giant Cantharus flees in terror from Cybele’s lions. Further on Zeus (not preserved) on his chariot is attacked by two giants. In the foreground, Hera bends to finish off a fallen giant; on her right, Athena has stricken down Verectas and is fighting with Laertas while Astartas is dying. A little further Ares is struggling with Viatas and Enatas, one of whom is picking up a stone to throw at the god. Immediately after, Hermes with raised sword is attacking two giants. On their right, part of Poseidon’s body is preserved. At the extremity of the frieze, an unidentified god is fighting with two giants.

The figure with the crest of his helmet supported by a cantharus is not Dionysus, but a giant. The peculiar shape of the support is explained by the fact that all the helmets worn by the giants are of fantastic design. This giant was one of the antagonists of Cybele and is fleeing in terror from her lions. Cybele, in the frieze, is identified by a hole for an earring, and cannot be Dionysus, as was originally thought. In addition there is the charioteer of Zeus, who cannot be identified


















Northern Frieze: Apollo and Artemis (at their feet the giant Ephialtas is already dead) are shooting with their arrows at three shielded giants (not visible here) as the giant Cantharus flees in terror from Cybele’s lions.



 
























Northern Frieze: Apollo and Artemis and Cantharos running from Cybele’s lions.

 
















Northern Frieze: On the left, Hera bends down to finish off a fallen giant; on her right, Athena has stricken down Verectas and is fighting with Laertas while Astartas is dying. Further left, Ares is struggling with Viatas and Enatas, one of whom is picking up a stone to throw at the god.


















Northern Frieze: In the foreground, Hera stoops to finish off a fallen giant; on her right, Athena.




















Northern Frieze: Ares is struggling with Viatas and Enatas, one of whom is picking up a stone to throw at the god.





As the northern side of the treasury looked upon the Sacred Way, the ascending pilgrims walking by would admire the unfolding of the action from left to right as the narrative unfolds in the frieze.


















Reconstruction of the northern side of the treasury, facing the Sacred Way.





4. The Eastern Frieze

The eastern frieze, whose subject is the Trojan War, is divided into two sections. The first part of the left-hand section shows a council of the gods watching from Olympus the battle taking place outside the walls of Troy and depicted in the right hand section of the frieze. The gods are divided into two groups, the protectors of the Trojans, and the protectors of the Greeks, respectively. On the left are shown the gods favoring the Trojans, turned towards their protégés. First Ares, wearing his armor as befits the god of war, sitting at one end. Next to him Aphrodite (or Leto), Artemis, Apollo, turned towards his sister, and finally Zeus on a magnificent throne. In front of Zeus there was Thetis, Achilles’ mother, as a suppliant, parts of her fingers touching the knees of Zeus in supplication are preserved. A little further and turned to the left, like the Greeks, were the gods favoring them: Poseidon, of whom nothing remains, Athena, Hera and Demeter. The scene depicts a well-known episode of the war, when Zeus, implored by Thetis, temporarily turned against the Greeks until the injustice done to her son Achilles by Agamemnon in taking from him the girl Briseis had been restored.
















Eastern Frieze: Artemisa, Aphrodite, Apollo and Zeus on his throne (fragment)

















Eastern Frieze: Aphrodite, Artemisa, Apollo










Eastern Frieze: From left to right: Ares, Aphrodite, Artemisa, Apollo and Zeus on his throne (fragment)
















Eastern Frieze: From left to right: Athena, Hera, and Demeter (or Thetis?)


In the second section of the eastern frieze, the battle going on outside the walls of Troy is shown. On the left are the Trojans: first a Trojan four-horse chariot with the charioteer Glaucus, then Aeneas and Hector. On the right are the Greeks. Menelaus holding a shield decorated with a Gorgon head. Ajax, a Greek four-horse chariot with the charioteer Automedon, and finally, alone, at the end, Nestor the wise adviser of the Greeks, urging them by his attitude to the action that will bring them victory. On the ground is a dead warrior.
















Eastern Frieze: A Trojan four-horse chariot with the charioteer Glaucus looking towards Aeneas and Hector, in the foreground.


















Eastern Frieze: A Trojan four-horse chariot with the charioteer Glaucus looking away.


Eastern Frieze: Menelaus holding a shield decorated with the Gorgon head of Medusa.



















5. Western Frieze

This frieze tells the story of the “Judgment of Paris.” Eris, the goddess of discord, not having been invited to the wedding of Peleus and Theits for obvious reasons, revenged the insult by throwing among the guests an apple inscribed: “For the most beautiful.” This caused a quarrel between Aphrodite, Athena and Hera, who each claimed the prize, and to end the strife, Zeus asked Paris, the young prince of Troy, to decide between them. Paris awarded the apple to Aphrodite. In the frieze, which unrolls in the way of a triptych, Hermes is shown at the left-hand end as a charioteer in the winged four-horse chariot of Athena, who winged herself, is hurriedly getting on the carriage. The male figure behind her is Hephaestus or Poseidon. Next the victorious Aphrodite is shown, getting off her chariot while trying to put a necklace around her neck. The admirable ingenuity and originality of the artist in presenting this theme and working out the details will be found again in the southern frieze. Though severely damaged, Aphrodite is still one of the loveliest figures in the whole sculptural decoration of the treasury of Siphnos. The right hand part of the frieze has not been preserved, but it can be assumed with certainty that it included a third chariot, and Hera.















Western Frieze: Aphrodite stepping off her chariot while trying to put a necklace around her neck



6. Southern Frieze

It has proved very difficult to ascertain the meaning of the southern frieze, or on the correct sequence of its preserved parts. Likely themes are the abduction of the daughters of Leucippus, king of Messenia, by the Dioscuri, Castor and Pollux, or Hippodamia, daughter of the king of Elis, Oenomaos, being carried off by Pelops, with Oenomaos starting to chase them. The parts preserved show first an abduction scene, and on the left a woman going away. In the middle there is an altar with a four-horse chariot (quadriga) in front of it, and finally two young horsemen followed by another four-horse chariot. The movement the postures and the shapes of the horses are admirably depicted and are unique in the archaic art of the Greeks.
























Southern Frieze: The quadriga before an altar




“Zeus reaches, as soon as thought, his ends:
Zeus, who can catch the winged eagle
And overtake the dolphin in the sea.
He can bring down any whose heart is high,
And to others he will give un-aging splendor.”

Pindar, Pythian Ode II (Bowra trans., Penguin 1969)