Archive for November, 2007
By: The Scribe on November, 2007
For a few years between 1915 and 1921, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York was thrilled to have acquired three statues created by the Etruscan civilization in Italy, which flourished between the 8th and 2nd centuries BC. Unfortunately, what the Museum didn’t know at the time was… they were forking over thousands of dollars for fakes.
The perpetrators of the scheme were two young men by the names of Riccardo Riccardi and Alfredo Fioravanti, who were rather skilled in the visual arts. As it turns out, Riccardo’s father and brothers were pottery “specialists” – read: forgers – but Riccardo was the most skilled out of his family. Along with his friend Alfredo, he decided that he’d like to make himself a little extra cash.
The first Etruscan warrior statue was modeled as a large, one-piece figure, but since the kiln wasn’t large enough to fit the whole thing, it was broken up into 24 pieces for firing and then rebuilt. The right arm of the warrior is missing, because the forgers couldn’t agree on how it should be positioned – and in order to avoid more arguments and potentially getting it wrong, thereby resulting in the Museum’s discovery of forgery – they simply broke off the arm and threw it away before presenting the piece to the Met.
After the successful sale of the ‘ancient’ figure to the museum, the pair began to work on another piece: a giant warrior’s head. Using a description by the ancient writer Pliny, who had once described a 25-foot tall statue of the god Jupiter from an ancient Roman temple, the head was created to stand four and a half feet high. Naturally, this was broken into pieces as well – 178 this time – then fired, and shipped away to the museum.
The pair was thrilled at their success! They’d expected things to go over well, but the Museum didn’t suspect a thing. Experts had been brought in to study the ‘ancient’ pieces and reports had been published on their meaning and place in the Etruscan culture… so the two men decided to embark on their most ambitious project thus far: the Colossal Terracotta Warrior. As they worked, the warrior took on a height of eight feet tall… but unfortunately, Riccardo was killed when he fell from his horse before the project was complete.
To replace him, Alfredo called upon two of Riccardo’s cousins, who weren’t nearly as skilled as he was. As they worked, the team became aware of a severe problem – the statue was going to be too large for the room they were creating it in! By the time they’d reached the waist, they realized that the well-known classical proportions of Etruscan sculpture was going to have to be ignored, since there was simply no space in the room to create a proper upper body – they’d have to open a hole in the ceiling to do that! The end result was a statue with perfectly proportioned legs… and a stocky, squat torso.
The Metropolitan Museum purchased the statue for an amount that is rumored to be the equivalent of around five million dollars today, and although the odd proportions were found troublesome by some scholars, the piece was still put on display. Still, rumors began to circulate as the art community tried to reconcile this piece with traditional Etruscan statues. Talk about the statues’ origins continued quietly for several decades, but the Museum refused to admit that anything had been amiss – after all, for the curator who’d acquired them, these pieces had been the distinguishing moment of her career.
In 1959, an Italian scholar visited the Museum and was offered a tour through to see the Etruscan statues – but oddly enough, he mentioned that he didn’t need to see them since he already knew the man who had created them! Finally, the Museum admitted that something might be wrong. In 1960, a number of tests were conducted on the statues’ glazes – and it was revealed that the pieces contained chemicals that had not been used before the 17th century.
In 1961, Alfredo Fioravanti confessed to creating all three statues, signed a written version of the confession, and presented one of the statues’ missing thumbs to prove it. The scandal of the Etruscan terracotta warriors was valuable in at least one respect: it revealed how much damage can be done when Museums become too eager to acquire pretty objects rather than truly inquire into their historical value.
Want to read more?
Tomorrow: Ancient Bulgaria’s Pliska
By: The Scribe on November, 2007
When talking about art in ancient history, it’s not unusual to stumble across unfamiliar pieces of terminology – and sometimes, the jargon is so obscure that there’s no way you’ll understand what it means unless someone explains it to you.
One of these random pieces of art terminology is the term ‘bilingual pottery’, which was a type of pottery that existed in ancient Greece around the 6th century BC. These vases almost exclusively came from Athens, and included the older black-figure style of decoration on one side of the pot and the newer red-figure style on the other side. Often, both sides would show the same scene, just each one done in a different style!
So, instead of having pots that spoke two languages, the ancient Greek bilingual pots actually showed a period of style-change in the artistic community. Why did the painters and potters decide to showcase both styles at once? It may have come about as a reflection of potters’ uncertainty as to whether or not the public would be willing to accept this new style of decoration – after all, if the public didn’t buy it, they’d have to come up with some new decorative style to market.
They need not have worried, however – red-figure decoration soon took off, and pieces of bilingual pottery became rarer and rarer. In fact, the period in which they were produced was quite short, which may be why so few examples have survived into the present day.
The names of potters who produced these kinds of pieces still survive, however – among those who created bilingual vases are included the Andokides Painter, the Lysippides Painter, Psiax, and Oltos. Of course, the painting style wasn’t limited to vases – Epiktetos the painter created some bilingual cups, while the Andokides Painter worked on both vases and bilingual amphorae.
Want to read more?
Tomorrow: Etruscan terracotta… forgeries!
By: The Scribe on November, 2007
Tigranes seemed to be set: he had an enormous amount of territory, vast armies at his disposal, and more than enough resources to boot. What could possibly go wrong? Of course, there was one thing he hadn’t counted on – the return of troublesome in-laws. Indeed, his father-in-law Mithridates IV managed to find refuge in Armenian lands after his peace treaty with Rome, and had been hiding out there ever since.
It was inevitable that Tigranes would eventually have his own conflict with the Romans – the two greatest powers in the world had to come to a head one way or another, since there was only so far either of them could expand before running into each other. The Roman general Lucullus was in control of the army now, and it just so happened that he knew where Mithridates IV was hiding. Rome demanded that Mithridates IV be expelled from Armenia, but naturally, Tigranes simply couldn’t give up his ally and father-in-law.
So, Tigranes went to battle with Rome in 69 BC because his father-in-law needed a place to stay. The battle was held at the city of Tigranocerta in Armenia, and though by all rights it should have been an easy victory, some of the non-Armenian guards betrayed Tigranes in the midst of battle by opening the city gates to the Romans – which forced Tigranes to redirect 6000 of his cavalrymen into the city in order to rescue his wives, children, and other assets. As a result, Tigranes officially lost the battle.
Not one to be shafted from victory, Tigranes and Mithridates regrouped and met Lucullus at the city of Artaxata the following year. The Armenian and Pontic forces were 70,000 strong, and cut a devastating swath through the Roman legions – so bad were the losses that between 68 and 67 BC, Lucullus’ troops staged three mutinies! Finally, Lucullus realized he was fighting a losing battle, and moved the fight in a different direction – instead of continuing to fight on the rough terrain of Northern Armenia, he moved south to plunder lands held by Tigranes’ brother.
Even so, Lucullus’ plan was a failure, and he was not able to defeat or capture either Tigranes or Mithridates. Disgusted in his performance, he was recalled by Rome and replaced with a new general: Pompey the Great. Meanwhile, Mithridates was able to return to Pontus with an army of 8,000 men, and Tigranes proceeded to recover much of his former territory. However, in the process, he fought and defeated his younger son who had accepted an army from Parthia – forcing the man to seek protection under the newest Roman general.
With his lands recovered and fully believing himself secured against Rome, Tigranes’ confidence would become his downfall. In 66 BC, Pompey advanced into Armenia with the younger son of Tigranes allied at his side. Realizing his mistake, Tigranes the Great – now nearly 75 years old – surrendered to Rome. To Rome’s credit, Pompey actually treated Tigranes with great dignity and generosity, allowing the former ‘king of kings’ to retain some portions of his empire in exchange for only 6,000 talents of silver. As for the unfaithful son, both Tigranes and Pompey agreed to send him back to Rome as a prisoner.
And so, until his death in 55 BC, Tigranes the Great – held in great respect by Rome for his military skills and vast territorial accomplishments – was thus allowed to rule Armenia as a Roman ally.
Want to read more?
Tomorrow: More Ancient Standard
By: The Scribe on November, 2007
Although Tigranes and Mithridates had experienced some great successes in their alliance, the Roman Empire managed to cut a blow to the strongest force Europe at this time. Mithridates IV was defeated – but not beaten – in the First Mithridatic War, and soon after forged a temporary peace settlement with Rome. This had certainly not been part of Tigranes’ plans, and so turning from his Pontic alliance, Tigranes decided to go it alone against the Parthian Empire.
The king under whom he had been held hostage died in 88 BC, and due to excessive internal squabbling and numerous Scythian invasions, Parthia seemed ripe for the taking. Tigranes promptly seized control of Parthia and his seventy valleys, ravaged the countryside, forced compliance out of the lands along the upper Tigris, and swept his army across Mesopotamia, the Euphrates, parts of Syria, and then Phoenicia, taking control of as much territory as possible.
Apparently, breaking the alliance with Mithridates had been a good thing! After a bloody feud in Syria for the throne, in 83 BC the Syrians actually chose Tigranes as their protector, offering him the crown. In acceptance, he destroyed the last remnants of the Seleucid Empire.
Tigranes had no qualms about devastating large territories and shipping off their inhabitants to a new city he’d built called Tigranakert. At the height of his empire, his borders stretched from the Pontic Alps to Mespotamia, and all the way across the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean. In a bit of a display of machismo, he went as far as Ecbatana in Persia and claimed the title ‘king of kings’ – an arrogant gesture even for him, since neither the Armenians nor the Parthians used this title for their leadership.
Prior to Tigranes’ assumption of power, none of the Armenian kings had issued coins, let alone coins with their own image stamped on them. Taking up the Seleucid tradition – after all, he had taken away their Syrian kingship – Tigranes had coins minted at Antioch and Damascus, and displayed the image of himself wearing an Armenian tiara with ear-flaps. Most of the coins were silver tetradrachms or copper, though a few gold examples have survived.
With so much territory and power, Tigranes seemed set. Who could oppose him now…?
Want to read more?
Tomorrow: The conclusion!
Previous page | Next page
