Parthenon. West frieze. Block 12 (XII)
Inventory number
Ακρ. 20026
Artist
Pheidias' workshop
Category
Architectural sculpture
Period
Classical Period
Date
442-438 BC
Dimensions
Height: 1.01 m
Length: 1.38 m
Width: 0.62 m
Material
Marble from Penteli
Location
Parthenon Gallery
Block XII shows two men and a little servant. The man in the centre, next to the horse that bends its head, is dressed in a short chiton and chlamys that falls over his back and is wrapped over his left forearm. In the same hand he would have once held a metal object, perhaps a caduceus. He most possibly is a herald who signals the start of the procession with his raised right arm. On the viewer’s left, a naked horseman with his chlamys falling over his back rests his hands on his staff, once rendered in bronze and fitted into the holes that are still visible on the man’s forearm and thigh. On the right, the little servant who carries his master’s himation over his shoulder may have held an object now lost. Many researchers connect the scene with the «passing muster» (dokimasia), that is the testing of both horse and rider’s capability.
The frieze on the west side of the Parthenon shows the riders preparing to take part in the procession of the Athenian people during the Panathenaic festival, in honour of the protectress of the city, Athena. The procession's destination was the Temple of Athena Polias on the Acropolis. Its purpose was the transportation of the Panathenaic peplos destined to adorn the age-old xoanon of the goddess and the offer of a grand sacrifice of animals at the Great Altar outside of the temple.
The horsemen on the west frieze are in the Kerameikos district, where the procession started. Some converse, some others fasten their sandals, some of them bridle their horses or try to soothe them, while a few horsemen are already galloping in loose formation.
The west frieze is preserved almost intact as the bombardment of the Parthenon by the Venetians under the command of the general Francesco Morosini in 1687 did not affect this side of the temple. Its total length is 21.18 m and is composed of sixteen blocks. Fourteen of them are displayed in the Acropolis Museum after they were removed from the Parthenon in 1993 and kept in the old Acropolis Museum for fifteen years. Blocks I and II are in the British Museum in London, where they ended up after they were forcibly removed by Thomas Bruce, lord of Elgin, between 1801 and 1804, when Greece was still under Ottoman occupation.
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