Plaster Cast Frieze: Grave Stele of Aristion

Missing palmette, top of the helmet, and tip of the beard. The latter two were sculpted separately and added to the stele. Tall and narrow with a light frame, the stele was joined with lead to its rectangular base. The deceased is represented as a hoplite, bearded, facing right with a light chiton, linen-based breastplate, helmet and greaves. In his left hand he grasps a spear, the other hand hangs down, and his feet are bare. Inscribed with “Aristionos,” the genitive case of the name of the deceased “Aristion” and “the work of Aristokles.” This sculptor’s name is also inscribed on the base of a grave statue found in the remains of the Themistoklean fortification wall of Athens. This inscription is in Greek but the dead man’s name is written in Karian letters.

The top part with a crowning (most likely a palmette) is missing. Aristion is depicted as a bearded hoplite facing right. He wears a short thin chiton above which is a corselet decorated with painted ornaments including maeanders, zigzags, and a star on the shoulder. He wears an Attic helmet (with its top imssing) on his head and greaves on his shins. His right arm hangs down and he holds a spear in his left hand. He stands bare foot on a projecting horizontal band on which is inscribed; ergon Aristokleous (the work of Aristokles). The beard is rendered by wavy incised lines and the hair is combed into spiral curls with volute terminals. The face is terracotta color with traces of red at the bottom of the slab.

This is one of the finest Late Archaic sculptures with the anatomical details dynamically worked, particularly the details of the upper arms and the quadriceps on the thighs. This is by the hand of the sculptor Aristokles who specialized in funerary sculptures. Robertson suggests that this may be the grave of the sculptor Aristion of Paros and, given the ancient Greek liking for using similar name forms in a family, possibly Aristokles who carved the stele may have been a relation of the deceased: son, brother, or nephew. Aristokles’ name is found on a base from the Themistoklean wall of Athens built after the battle of Salamis from the ruins of the Persian destruction of the city. This base is from a grave monument of a Karian who had died in Athens. The inscription is in Greek but the deceased’s name is also given in Karian letters. Robertson then posits that Aristokles’ portrayal of Skylax’s son, Tymnes, is partially preserved in the Sabouroff head in the Berlin Museum as a representation of a foreigner, which explains some unusual aspects of the head in the Attic tradition to which it clearly belongs.

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