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book: The Transformation of Athens
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The Transformation of Athens

Painted Pottery and the Creation of Classical Greece
  • and
Language: English
Published/Copyright: 2018

About this book

How remarkable changes in ancient Greek pottery reveal the transformation of classical Greek culture

Why did soldiers stop fighting, athletes stop competing, and lovers stop having graphic sex in classical Greek art? The scenes depicted on Athenian pottery of the mid-fifth century BC are very different from those of the late sixth century. Did Greek potters have a different world to see—or did they come to see the world differently? In this lavishly illustrated and engagingly written book, Robin Osborne argues that these remarkable changes are the best evidence for the shifting nature of classical Greek culture.

Osborne examines the thousands of surviving Athenian red-figure pots painted between 520 and 440 BC and describes the changing depictions of soldiers and athletes, drinking parties and religious occasions, sexual relations, and scenes of daily life. He shows that it was not changes in each activity that determined how the world was shown, but changes in values and aesthetics.

By demonstrating that changes in artistic style involve choices about what aspects of the world we decide to represent as well as how to represent them, this book rewrites the history of Greek art. By showing that Greeks came to see the world differently over the span of less than a century, it reassesses the history of classical Greece and of Athenian democracy. And by questioning whether art reflects or produces social and political change, it provokes a fresh examination of the role of images in an ever-evolving world.

Author / Editor information

Robin Osborne is Professor of Ancient History at the University of Cambridge, where he is also a Fellow of King’s College. His books include Archaic and Classical Greek Art; Greece in the Making, 1200–479 BC; Athens and Athenian Democracy; and The History Written on the Classical Greek Body.

Reviews

"[The Transfomation of Athens] reinstates Athenian pottery to the place it deserves and acknowledges the enormous potential of painted vases to illuminate many areas of Greek culture. . . . This is a lucid, engaging and persuasive book."---Diana Rodríguez Pérez, Burlington Magazine --- "Osborne’s gifts as an observer of ancient art are beyond dispute. His discussions of the vase scenes he has chosen to explore are filled with the kind of insight that make one inclined to accept any conclusions to which they might lead. His book offers a radically new approach to the Attic vases, one that might even achieve the two grand goals Osborne sets for it: not only to 'rewrite the history of art' but also to 'rewrite history.'"---James Romm, New York Review of Books --- "Co-Winner of the 2019 Runciman Award, Anglo-Hellenic League"

Topics

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    Frontmatter

    i
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    Contents

    v
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    Figures

    vii
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    Plates

    xiii
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    Abbreviations

    xv
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    Preface

    xvii
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  • I
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    The Art of Transformation

    3
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    Athenian Pottery and Athenian Culture

    26
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  • II
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    Changing in the Gymnasium

    53
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    Changing the Guard

    87
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    Courting Change

    122
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    Sacrificing Change

    151
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    Drinking to and Reveling in Change

    168
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    The changing city of satyrs

    188
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  • III
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    Morality, Politics, and Aesthetics

    207
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    The Transformation of Art

    249
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    Bibliography

    259
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    Index

    277
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Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
September 10, 2018
eBook ISBN:
9781400889938
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
View content
https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400889938
eBook ISBN: 9781400889938
Keywords for this book
Pottery; Himation; Iconography; Hoplite; Krater; Sculpture; Maenad; Courtship; Polykleitos; Red-Figure Pottery; Ancient Greek art; Hellenistic period; Thucydides; Vulci; Glyptothek; Narrative; Strigil; Euphronios; Lekythos; Archaic Greece; Libation; Amasis Painter; Brygos Painter; Warfare; Work of art; Classical Greece; Classical Athens; Kritios; Allusion; Drinking; Euripides; Harmodius and Aristogeiton; Greek art; Josiah Ober; Pediment; Simonides of Ceos; War; Martin Classical Lectures; Greek tragedy; Classical sculpture; Catullus; Apuleius; Pericles; Chiton (costume); Peisistratos; Anne Carson; Horace; Ideology; Procession; Niobid Painter; Amphora; Latin poetry; Paul Celan; Pornography; The Golden Ass; Writing; Berlin Painter; Poetry; Herodotus; Narration; Kritios Boy; Suggestion; Penis; Staatliche Antikensammlungen; Classical archaeology; Wreath; Skyphos; Hydria; The Various; Popularity
Audience(s) for this book
For an expert adult audience, including professional development and academic research
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