Which Period Is Named for the Influence of Egypt and the Near East on Greek Art?
"Gave rise to Greek sculpture" you say? There actually was a time before sculpture in Ancient Greece. Well, betwixt sculpture, actually—the Greek Night Age—between the relatively advanced Bronze Historic period and the much later Orientalizing and Primitive Periods. Remember dorsum in episode v on the Art Found'south Corinthian pyxis, we talked nigh the Orientalizing Period of approximately the 7th century BC—to quote myself, "The Orientalizing Menstruation is a time when the Greeks renew contact and trade with the different civilizations of the Mediterranean and the Ancient Near East after a long menstruation of isolation during the Greek Dark Age and Geometric Period. This is a fascinating time of rediscovery, invention, and assimilation."
In that episode we looked at a few of the interesting Near Eastern influences in the developing arts of Greece. On Greek vase painting, we start to see fantastical creatures of the Nearly East, like sphinxes, griffins, and chimeras, and the adoption of long-continuing, stock, About Eastern decorative motifs like rosettes and palmettes. The Orientalizing Period was a fourth dimension when the Greeks were suddenly thrust onto the world stage through mercantile exchange with Phoenicia, Syria, and other Most Eastern nations. The Greeks became familiar with Near Eastern artistic traditions through all the patterned textiles, decorated vessels, and other ornamentation that these strange merchants brought with them to Corinth and other ports of trade. But just as the Greeks enjoyed and adopted these Near Eastern designs, they also immediately assimilated and adapted them to suit their own needs. And nosotros discussed one example of this absorption at length in the decoration of the Fine art Institute'due south Corinthian pyxis.
There are a number of other profound developments in the Greek arts at this fourth dimension, similar the general manner in which the human being form is represented on a two-dimensional painted surface. In episode 5 we explored how some areas of the Greek mainland, similar Athens, continue in the traditional vase painting design of the previous century, with a stark contrast of the darkly silhouetted geometric figures against a background of meandering patterns. Corinth, still, pushes this bated for a more natural style of gentle curves and elaborate outlines of the figure's contour with a smoother, flowing brush. Nosotros see the detail of human anatomy, facial features, and pleats and folds in the drapery. Coloration also makes its way onto the scene with the use of added red and white. The human form also becomes more dynamic, breaking away from the static paratactic pose of the Geometric Menses. Shoulders and the chest might be seen in profile as opposed to the odd rendering of two shoulders and a frontal chest with a face turned in profile. And so we start to see an increased attention to the naturalism, the manner in which the reality of the three-dimensional world works and how it tin be expressed on a two-dimensional surface, a feat which the Greeks are only at present beginning to undertake. Simply I don't mean to give all the credit to Corinth. During the Archaic Period of the tardily 7th and 6th century BC, Athens was breaking new ground too, as nosotros'll soon encounter with the appearance of sculpture.
The introduction of free standing awe-inspiring sculpture stems from some other fascinating influence on the developing Greek arts, which deserves a lot of attention—but for this influence we need to wait a piddling south to Egypt. Contemporary to the second half of the Greek Orientalizing Period and first half of the Archaic Period was the Egyptian 26th Dynasty, the Saite Dynasty of the Late Catamenia. Nosotros call information technology the Saite Dynasty on account of the capital letter of Egypt at this time, the city of Sais in the delta region. And what time is this? We're talking 664-525 BC. During the prior few centuries of the 3rd Intermediate Menstruation, Arab republic of egypt actually blew it and lost all the power and influence that it acquired during the New Kingdom. Now during the Late Menstruation, many of the nations surrounding Egypt had get major political and military powers that Egypt had to fence with. Since the Egyptian army wasn't a whole heck of a lot to avowal most, Pharaoh Psammetichus I (or in the Egyptian Psamtik) took the bold leap of hiring foreign mercenaries to fill the void. Psammetichus not only wanted to plant a strong armed forces presence in Egypt, only he also wanted to forge war machine, political, and economic alliances with sympathetic strange powers, namely the Greeks.
The Saite Dynasty is one of the coolest fourth dimension periods in the history of the Mediterranean, because this is when nosotros see for first time a strong Greek presence is Egypt. Psammetichus and other Saite rulers used Greek mercenaries to fight their battles and Greek merchants and craftsmen to support a strong economic system of strange merchandise in the Mediterranean. We even run into the establishment in Egypt of Greek military barracks and the thriving development of a Greek civilian settlement. The port metropolis of Naukratis exploded onto the scene every bit the short-lived, but preeminent port of trade in the Mediterranean. Sadly, today there'south not much more remaining than a few foundations. Naukratis was a fascinating melting pot of Egyptian and Greek culture. Greek and Egyptian temples were erected side-by-side. Greek merchants and craftsmen fix shop and traveled the Nile, seeing firsthand the splendors of the ii-and-a-half thousand year-onetime Egyptian civilization. And just as the Greeks were inclined to adopt Near Eastern ideas to enhance their creative repertoire, there are besides some very distinct Egyptian influences on the cultural evolution of Hellenic republic in the aspects of domestic and religious art, temple architecture, and even religious belief and ritual. Greeks brainstorm to visit Egyptian temples, dedicating bronze Egyptian votive bronze with Greek prayers inscribed on them. Greek votive statuary begins to take on an Egyptian form like this figurine of a seated woman nursing a child, which closely resembles the very pop effigy type of Isis nursing the kid Horus.
And so, at the kickoff of this episode I said we'll take brief a look at the historical climate that gave rise to Greek sculpture. We did that, the stage is gear up, and before I start to lose you, nosotros're going to wrap things upwardly here. Nosotros'll option up side by side time with a close expect at one of the primeval known and virtually intact Greek sculptures of a particular statue blazon chosen a "kouros"—the so-called "Metropolitan Kouros" at the Metropolitan Museum of Fine art in New York.
Be sure to check out the bibliography at scarabsolutions.com for a number of references on the Greek contact with Egypt during the Saite Dynasty. On a technical note, if you were having trouble viewing some of the photo albums on the website using version three of Firefox, that'south because of a javascript incompatibility between iWeb and Firefox 3. After much searching of the online Apple support forum, one crash, and some colorful linguistic communication, I think I've managed to implement a fix, so y'all should be able to browse the photo albums again. Thanks for listening and tune in soon for the adjacent episode of the SCARABsolutions Ancient Art Podcast.
©2008 Lucas Livingston, ancientartpodcast.org
mcclemenshisherear97.blogspot.com
Source: https://www.ancientartpodcast.org/blog/15/
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