the excavation of the athenian agora twelfth season: 1947

EXCAVATION OF ATHENIAN AGORA, 1947 181
on his donkey by applying his enormous club to the little creature's hindquarters;
he uses his lion skin as a saddle cloth. The representation of Herakles mounted is
rare, but recurs on a small limestone plaque from Rhodes which is inscribed as a
dedication to Herakles.3 The motivation of the scene clearly comes from without and
it is tempting to suppose that the coroplast has adapted an excerpt from some monu-
mental representation of Hephaistos' return to Olympus. If Hephaistos were sub-
stituted for Herakles the scene could be paralleled in several vase paintings of the
sixth and fifth centuries which show Hephaistos, deliberately befuddled, being enticed
heavenward by Dionysos and his accomplices.64
The terracotta bust of P1. 61, 1 appeared in a late Hellenistic level in the filling
of the Great Drain at the west foot of the Areopagus.65 The Phrygian cap with its
peak and flaps, and the curious sexual duality mark the figure as Attis, a commoon
theme in Hellenistic terracottas.6
The further clearing of the west slope of the Areopagus produced in this season
as in 1939 and 1946 numerous figurines of the third and second centuries B.C. together
with moulds for their manufacture, coming no doubt, as noted above, from coroplasts'
workshops within the area. This material will be the subject of a special study, so that
for the present occasion samples only are illustrated: in P1. 61, 2 67 some representative
heads both male and female and in P1. 61, 3 a characteristic mould, together with a
modern impression, of a youthful torso, probably Eros.68
In the early Roman period in Athens terracotta figurines did not enjoy the popu-
larity that had been theirs in the Hellenistic period and that they were to recover in
the later Roman period. On the other hand the plastic decoration of vases, lamps,
etc., sometimes attained a high level; a particularly fine piece is illustrated in P1. 61, 4.
It is a male head wearing a laurel wreath impressed in relief in the medallion on the
floor of a small bowl.9 The fabric of the bowl and such use of a medallion are char-
acteristic of the Augustan period. The head is obviously a portrait, and comparison
with coins leaves little doubt that we have to do with a slightly idealized representation
of Augustus himself. In sheer beauty of design and competence of modelling the
terracotta medallion invites comparison with some of the finer of the many cameos
in which Augustus is represented.70
63 Beschreibung der antiken Skulpturen zu Berlin, no. 689.
64 Schefold, Ath. Mitt., 59, 1934, pp. 137-146; Talcott, Hesperia, VI, 1937, pp. 47-49.
65 T 2425. Height, 0.11 m. Traces of white engobe.
66 For the type cf. Burr, Terracottas from Myrina, p. 57.
67 T 2455, 2437, 2436, 2339, 2337, 2427.
68 T 2454. Height, 0.132 m.
69 p 18,314. Diameter of medallion, 0.055 m. Fine buff clay covered with thin glaze which has
fired red on the underside, mottled brown and red on top. On the underside is the merest suggestion
of a base-ring surrounded by scattered floral ornaments.
70 Furtwangler, Antike Gemmen, III, pp. 314 ff.; Schweizer, R6m. Mitt., 57, 1942, pp. 97-99.