Zeus : a study in ancient religion - Warburg Institute

Gradual elimination of the thunderbolt 737
is found again, with a suggestion of greater repose, on the heW-krater
from Falerii in the Villa Giulia at Rome, a vase attributed by G.
Nicole^ P. Ducati^ and J. C. Hoppin^ to the ' Talos painter,' and
referable to the period of the Peloponnesian War (fig. 668)^ Its
obverse design represents Herakles, his labours over at last, entering
the presence of Zeus. Herakles is followed by Hebe, in whose ear
Eros whispers of her coming wedlock. Hera, proud and resentful,
will not look at Herakles, but turns her head away and addresses
Hermes. Zeus in an attitude of dignified ease worthy of Pheidias"
receives his heroic son. Wreath, sceptre, throne are there, and
rightly there. But the thunderbolt would be out of place, and the
god's right hand is empty.
The same transition from might to right in the popular con-
ception of Zeus can be equally well illustrated from the remains
of ancient sculpture. His earliest extant effigy, a bronze statuette
from Mount Lykaion (s. vii B.C.), shows a nude bearded god standing
erect with a thunderbolt in his raised right hand and an eagle on
his outstretched left {supra i. 84 fig. 51). It is thus in all probability
that we should conceive of such images as the Zeus in hammered
gold dedicated at Olympia by Kypselos, tyrant of Corinth (655
625 B.C.)", or the Zeus Hypatos in hammered bronze made by
fig. 667), Reinach Rep. Vases i. 222, i— 5, A. Furtwangler in Roscher Lex. Myth. i. 2238 f.
fig-
_ _
^ G. Nicole Meidias et le styleJleuri dans la ceramiqiie attiqiie Geneve 1908 p. 93 ff.
pi. 6, 3.
^ P. Diicati I vast dipinti nello stile del ceramista Midia Roma 1909 p. 50, id. in the
Rom. Mitth. 1906 xxi. 126.
^ Hoppin Red-fig. Vases ii. 450 no. 4.
•* Furtwangler—Reichhold Gr. Vasenmalerei i. 87 ff. pi. 20 ( =my fig. 668) Villa Giulia
no. 2382. Height o'40"'.
^ Supra i. 91 f., m/ra § 9 (h) ii {Q).
® Plat. Phaedr. 236 B Trapa to Kv\^€\l8Qv apadrj/xa (T