- Museum number
- 2013,5005.1.22
- Description
-
Study of the seated figure of Ares (Block IV, figure 27) of the east frieze of the Parthenon (BM Cat. Sculpture 324)
Verso: crossed out writing?
Graphite on a sheet of paper inlaid into a second sheet together with 2013,5005.1.21, 2013,5005.1.23, and 2013,5005.1.24
- Production date
- 1765-1766
- Dimensions
-
Height: 444 millimetres (of second sheet)
-
Height: 102 millimetres
-
Width: 631 millimetres (of second sheet)
-
Width: 88 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
- Curator's comments
- This drawing was originally from an album of drawings by William Pars made during the Dilettanti Society's expedition to Greece and Asia Minor 1764-6 under the direction of Richard Chandler. The majority of them were engraved for 'Antiquities of Athens' and many others for 'Ionian Antiquities'. The album is bound in brown leather and tooled in gold on spine "Architectural Drawings & Views in Greece & Asia Minor 1764-67 / Vol. I / Presented to the British Museum by the Dilettanti Society". This volume, together with volume II (2013,5005.2), was given to the British Museum by the Society of Dilettanti in June 1800. It originally contained 84 drawings by Pars, 26 of which were removed from the album and transferred to the Department of Prints and Drawings. 17 of these were published by A. Wilton. 58 drawings remain in the Department of Greece and Rome and were removed from the album in 2013.
See:
Richard Chandler, 'Travels in Greece, or an Account of a Tour Made at the Expense of the Society Of Dillettanti', (1776), p.57-58
'On the frieze of the cell was carved, in basso relieve, the solemnity of a sacrifice to Minerva; and of this one hundred and seventy feet are standing, the greater part in good preservation, containing a procession on horseback. On two stones, which have fallen, are oxen led as victims. On another, fourteen feet long, are the virgins called Canephori, which assisted at the rites, bearing the sacred canisters on their heads, and in their hands each a taper; with other figures, one a venerable person with a beard, reading in a large volume, which is partly supported by a boy. This piece, now inserted in the wall of the fortress, is supposed to have ranged in the centre of the back front of the cell. The sacrifice designed to be represented was probably that performed at stated times by the Athenian cavalry; and perhaps the figure last mentioned is the herald praying for the prosperity of the Athenians and Platæensians, as was usual, in commemoration of their united bravery at Marathon. We purchased two fine fragments of the frieze, which we found inserted over door-ways in the town; and were presented with a beautiful trunk, which had fallen from the metopes, and lay neglected in the garden of a Turk.
The marquis de Nointell, ambassador from France to the Porte in the year 1672, employed a painter to delineate the frieze; but his sketches, the labour of a couple of months, must have been very imperfect, being made from beneath, without scaffolding, his eyes straining upwards. Mr Pars devoted a much longer time to this work, which he executed with diligence, fidelity, and courage. His post was generally on the architrave of the colonnade, many feet from the ground, where he was exposed to gusts of wind, and to accidents in passing to and fro. Several of the Turks murmured, and some threatened, because he overlooked their houses; obliging them to confine or remove the women, to prevent their being seen from that exalted station. Besides views and other sculptures, he designed one hundred and ninety-six feet of bass-reliefs in the acropolis'
See also:
'Ionian Antiquities', published by the Society of Dilettanti, Vol. 1 (1769) and Vol. II (1797)
Richard Chandler, 'Travels in Asia Minor 1764-1765', edited and abridged by Edith Clay, with an appreciation of William Pars by Andrew Wilton, (1971)
Bruce Redford, 'Dilettanti: the antic and the antique in eighteenth-century England', (2008)
Jason M. Kelly, 'The Society of Dilettanti: archaeology and identity in the British enlightenment', (2009)
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1800 (June)
- Department
- Greek and Roman
- Registration number
- 2013,5005.1.22