Greek Material Culture

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Article

orders, architectural  

Richard Allan Tomlinson

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture

The main Greek orders of architecture are Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. The definitive form of Doric is established by the beginning of the 6th cent. bce. Earlier temples in stone (Apollo Corinth, perhaps Poseidon Isthmia) seem to have had plain cornices with no traces, yet, of the detailed Doric entablature. Developed entablatures, though, seem to represent the translation into stone of forms which originated in wooden construction, though not necessarily architectural. Ionic evolved at the same time, but took longer to reach definitive form; there are important local variations at least until the early-Hellenistic period.

The origin of these systems is uncertain. Wooden columns similar to Doric (but with no evidence for the entablature) had been used in Aegean late bronze age architecture, but these cannot have survived to the early evolution of Doric in the 7th cent. bce. The structural origin of elements in the entablature (e.g. the guttae which represent the wooden pegs fixing different elements together) is certain, but cannot be extended to all parts. The triglyph and metope frieze may be an adaptation of decorative patterns found in carpentry and the decorative arts, though a structural origin has been argued.

Article

orientation  

Nicholas Purcell

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
  2. Roman Material Culture
The patterning of the human environment according to generally accepted calibrations of ambient space took a number of forms in ancient Mediterranean cultures, and particularly in religious contexts, such as the laying out of *sanctuaries according to the cardinal points (that is to solar phenomena: there is little evidence of lunar or stellar orientations), or to face parts of ritually or mythically important landscapes (note the orientation of sanctuaries in Latium towards the *Albanus mons). A connection between the sunrise quarter and the right hand was found in Greek practice (cf. Il. 12. 237 f.), and an eastward orientation is common but not mandatory for *temples (e.g. the *Parthenon). Conversely the west was inauspicious and used in cursing (e.g. Lysias 6. 51), though many Anatolian goddess-temples faced west (see anatolian deities). Roman augury (see augures) was one of the most developed of such systems, with a complex division of the sky and the land beneath it from the observer's viewpoint, which was closely related to the cardinal points and to the practices of land division (augural sanctuary of *Bantia; orientation of the *centuriation of the ager Campanus; see campania).

Article

ostraca  

Walter Eric Harold Cockle

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
Ostraca are potsherds used for writing. Almost all found in Greece are incised; in Athens they were used particularly in voting in *ostracism. In Egypt the great majority are written with pen and ink. There the preferred fabric is the neck or shoulders of an *amphora. The discrepancy is probably due to humid conditions of survival in Europe. In Egypt the Ptolemaic ostraca from the Nile valley are mainly tax receipts written in abbreviated form; later, orders and lists are common. Letters, school exercises, and religious texts, pagan and Christian, increase. The military ostraca from *Mons Claudianus and the Wadi Fawakhir in the Eastern Desert are of a different character: documents and letters are more extensive, there is more Latin, and ostraca are used where papyrus would have been the norm in the Nile valley. The Greek-Demotic Archive of Hor from Saqqara provides important evidence for the chronology of Antiochus IV Epiphanes' invasion of Egypt.

Article

Oxyrhynchus  

Walter Eric Harold Cockle

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Ancient Geography
  2. Greek Material Culture

Oxyrhynchus (Behnesa), a nome capital (see nomos(1)) beyond the Bahr Yusuf west of the Nile, was the richest source of papyri ever found in Egypt. Grenfell and Hunt excavated for papyri (1897–1906) and were succeeded by Pistelli and Breccia (1910–34). The finds came from rubbish mounds north-west and south-east of the town; they are now worked out. Most are Roman or Byzantine; the Ptolemaic levels lay beneath the water table. Over 70 per cent of surviving literary papyri come from Oxyrhynchus.

Sculptured funeral stelae of the 1st–3rd cents. ce from a cemetery west of the town came on the market in the 1970s.

Article

palaestra  

Richard Allan Tomlinson

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture

Palaestra (παλαίστρα) was a wrestling ground, a place for athletic exercise, whether public or private, which eventually took the conventional form of an enclosed courtyard surrounded by rooms for changing, washing, etc. The application of the term to actual buildings is often uncertain; conventionally it is used for structures significantly smaller in size than the developed gymnasia (see gymnasium) which are similar in arrangement. However the palaestra at *Olympia, distinguished as such from the gymnasium by *Pausanias (3) (6. 21. 1), measures altogether 66.35×66.75 m. (217½;×219 ft.), larger than gymnasia elsewhere (e.g. *Priene). It is, however, adjacent to a normal, larger colonnaded court, only partly preserved, which here constitutes the gymnasium. The distinction is one of usage, rather than form. See athletics; wrestling.

Article

Pamphilus (1), painter, 4th cent. BCE  

Thomas Bertram Lonsdale Webster and Antony Spawforth

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
Pamphilus (1) (4th cent. bce), painter, of *Amphipolis. Pupil of Eupompus of Sicyon (contemporary of *Parrhasius); teacher of *Apelles, *Pausias, *Melanthius (2). He painted a ‘Battle at Phlius’ (probably 367 bce) and the *Heraclidae, referred to by *Aristophanes (1) (Plut.

Article

Panaenus, fl. 448 BCE  

Thomas Bertram Lonsdale Webster and Karim Arafat

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
Panaenus (fl. 448 bce, acc. to *Pliny (1)), Athenian painter, brother (or nephew) of *Phidias. He helped Phidias with the colouring of the Olympian Zeus (see olympia) and painted mythical scenes on screens between the cella columns. In the temple of *Athena in *Elis he put on plaster mixed with milk and saffron (for fresco?), and painted the inside of the shield of Colotes' Athena.

Article

pankration  

Frederick Adam Wright and Stephen Instone

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture
In the pankration (παγκράτιον), *boxing and *wrestling were combined with kicking, strangling, and twisting. It was a dangerous sport, but strict rules were enforced by the umpires. Biting and gouging were forbidden (except at Sparta, Philostr. Imag.348), but nearly every manœuvre of hands, feet, and body was permissible. You might kick your opponent in the stomach, twist his foot out of its socket, or break his fingers (cf. Paus.

Article

papyrology, Greek  

H. Maehler

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek History and Historiography
  2. Greek Law
  3. Greek Literature
  4. Greek Material Culture
Papyrus, manufactured in Egypt since c.3000 bce from a marsh plant, Cyperus papyrus (see books, greek and roman), was the most widely used writing material in the Graeco-Roman world. The object of papyrology is to study texts written on papyrus (and on ostraca, wooden tablets, etc. in so far as they come from the same find-spots) in Egyptian (hieroglyphs, demotic, Coptic), Hebrew, *Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Pahlavi, and Arabic. Greek papyrology also deals with Greek texts written on parchment (see palaeography, Introduction). The vast majority of Greek papyri have been found in Egypt, preserved in the dry sand; with the exception of some carbonized papyri from *Bubastis and Thmouis, no papyri have survived in the damp soils of the Delta or *Alexandria (1). Outside Egypt, Greek papyri have been found at *Herculaneum, at Dura-*Europus, in Palestine, and one text has come from Greece: the carbonized Orphic commentary found in a burial at Derveni near Salonica; see orphic literature; orphism.

Article

Parrhasius  

Thomas Bertram Lonsdale Webster and Karim Arafat

Article

Publication History:

Published online:
07 March 2016
Subjects:
  1. Greek Material Culture

Parrhasius, famous painter, son, and pupil of Euenor of Ephesus, later Athenian. *Pliny (1) dates Euenor420 bce and Parrhasius397 (with *Zeuxis (1), his great rival), while Quintilian says Parrhasius worked during the Peloponnesian War; but he made designs for Mys' reliefs on the shield of *Phidias' Athena Promachus (before 450). He was arrogant and wore a purple cloak and a gold wreath. He painted a ‘rose-fed’ *Theseus, an uncomplimentary picture of the *Demos, ‘Healing of *Telephus (1)’, *Philoctetes, ‘Feigned madness of *Odysseus’. Such pictures displayed the character (ethos) and expression which he discusses with *Socrates in the Memorabilia of *Xenophon (1). He wrote on painting. He was famed for subtlety of outline; Zeuxis for light and shade. His gods and heroes became types for later artists; his drawings on parchment and wood were used by craftsmen in Pliny's time.