Journal article
KOUROI AND THE ARCHAIC POLIS: AUDIENCE AND RECEPTION
American journal of archaeology, Vol.105(2), p.289
04/01/2001
Abstract
Current scholarship suggests that kouroi statues functioned as funerary monuments and votives, exemplifying aristocratic ideals and values in a panhellenic context. A survey of provenanced kouroi, however, demonstrates that the genre tends to be local in placement and social function, and that the primary intended audience for kouroi was found within the polis, rather than outside of it. The material evidence suggests that votive kouroi are almost exclusively clustered in extraurban sanctuaries and are typically local in style, even at major cult sanctuaries such as the Heraion at Samos. The lack of competitive kouroi dedications from other poleis in a forum well suited for such competition cannot simply be explained by transportation costs. Rather, it suggests that the primary audience is found within the polis itself. The primacy of an internal audience is strengthened when one notes the rarity of kouroi dedications at disputed border sanctuaries and Panhellenic sanctuaries. The production and display of kouroi can be explicitly linked to communication between aristocratic factions within the polis. Through their ideal physicality, the kouroi symbolically express aristocratic values of arete and kalokagathia in a dialectic display designed to confirm and strengthen the dedicant's vertical and horizontal ties within the polis. The use of kouroi statues in the Greek world for over 160 years suggests that;it is a flexible tool for aristocrats, indeed, the statuary type with its dualistic expression of intraelite competition and solidarity is only abandoned when tyrannies or democracies override the traditional aristocratic power base.
Details
- Title: Subtitle
- KOUROI AND THE ARCHAIC POLIS: AUDIENCE AND RECEPTION
- Creators
- Brenda J Longfellow
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- American journal of archaeology, Vol.105(2), p.289
- Publisher
- Archaeological Institute of America
- ISSN
- 0002-9114
- eISSN
- 1939-828X
- Language
- English
- Date published
- 04/01/2001
- Description audience
- Academic
- Academic Unit
- Art and Art History; University College Courses
- Record Identifier
- 9984398316802771
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