Description
Book SynopsisThe eighth and seventh centuries BCE were a time of flourishing exchange between the Mediterranean and the Near East. One of the period's key imports to the Hellenic and Italic worlds was the image of the griffin, a mythical monster that usually possesses the body of a lion and the head of an eagle. In particular, bronze cauldrons bore griffin protomesfigurative attachments showing the neck and head of the beast. Crafted in fine detail, the protomes were made to appear full of vigor, transfixing viewers. Bronze Monsters and the Cultures of Wonder takes griffin cauldrons as case studies in the shifting material and visual universes of preclassical antiquity, arguing that they were perceived as lifelike monsters that introduced the illusion of verisimilitude to Mediterranean arts. The objects were placed in the tombs of the wealthy (Italy, Cyprus) and in sanctuaries (Greece), creating fantastical environments akin to later cabinets of curiosities. Yet griffin cauldrons were accessible
Table of Contents
- List of Illustrations
- Preface
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Part I. Griffin Cauldrons in Contexts of Life and Death
- Chapter 1. Eastern Mediterranean, Ionia, and the Aegean
- Chapter 2. Mainland Greece
- Chapter 3. Italy and France
- Part II. Sources for the Lives of Griffin Cauldrons
- Chapter 4. Kolaios’s Monster Cauldron at the Heraion of Samos (Herodotus 4.152)
- Chapter 5. Monsters in Images: Pictorial Representations of Griffin Cauldrons
- Part III. Responses to the Uncanny
- Chapter 6. Vision of Wonders
- Conclusion. Disenchantment
- Notes
- References
- Index
