Ancient Greek civilization lasted about 2000 years. In those days, the territory of Ancient Greece was very extensive: the Balkans, southern Italy, the Aegean region and Anatolia plus modern Crimea. Over the two thousand-year history of the existence of Hellas, the ancient Greeks created and perfected not only the economic system, republican structure and civil society structure, but developed their culture in such a way that it had a significant impact on the formation of world culture.
The Hellenes have reached such a high level in the development of their culture in all areas that no one has yet been able to approach its level. The ancient Greeks were not the first, but the best in the development of their cultural heritage. A lot of works of the Hellenes have come down to our times. Let me give you a sculpture as an example. It will be discussed in the article.
Sculptors of Hellas
The art of Ancient Greece served as an example and basis for modern art forms. The sculpture of the classical era stands out in particular. Ancient Greece had entire dynastiessculptors, they honed their skills to such an extent that people from different countries came to admire their work. And today these works cause awe and admiration. Their names have come down to us: Miron, Poliklet, Phidias, Lysippus, Leohar, Skopas, and many others. The works of these masters are exhibited in the best museums and galleries of the world to this day. One of these geniuses was Praxiteles.
Praxitel
This outstanding sculptor came from a dynasty of great masters - his grandfather and father were also sculptors. One of the most famous works of my grandfather were the pediments of the exploits of Hercules for the temple in the capital of Upper Egypt - Thebes.
Praxtetel's father, Kefisodot, was an outstanding sculptor: he sculpted marble and bronze statues. Several of his works have survived to this day. The originals are in Munich, and several copies are kept in private collections. One of the most famous works that can be seen today is Eirene and Plutos.
The sons of Praxiteles also became famous sculptors.
Praxiteles was born in Athens around 390 BC. From childhood, he disappeared into his father's workshops, where Kefisodot's friends gathered. These were eminent artists, philosophers and poets. The atmosphere prevailing in those workshops influenced the boy: at a young age he already knew who he wanted to become. Having matured, Praxiteles reached such heights in skill that he began to receive orders from temples. In Hellas, as you know, there was a polygenetic religion, and in each temple they worshiped one or another deity withOlympus.
One of the most famous sculptures of Praxiteles that has survived to this day was the statue of Hermes with the infant Dionysus. This work was found during excavations in Olympia, on the site where the temple of Hera was. The statue is elegantly made, the marble is polished, the figure of Hermes is striking in its proportionality, the face of the god of trade looks like a living one. The cloak of Hermes, thrown over the trunk of a tree, seems real, the hairs on it are so worked out. The statue of Hermes with the infant Dionysus is kept in the city of Olympia in the Archaeological Museum.
The sculptures of Praxiteles differed from those of his contemporaries. Thanks to his skill, he became one of the most famous sculptors of his time. To give special expressiveness to the sculpture, the master preferred to paint them. He entrusted this work to his friend Nikiya, who was a well-known artist. But during the life of Praxiteles, it was not the statue of Hermes that brought him fame and veneration, but several statues of the goddess of love Aphrodite.
Statue of Aphrodite of Knidos
Once Praxiteles went to Ephesus (now Selçuk in Turkey) to help the Ephesians rebuild the temple of Aremis, which had been burned by the vandal Herostratus. There, the sculptor had to recreate the decorations for the altar in the temple. On the way to Ephesus, the master stayed in the city of Kos (now Bodrum in Turkey), because the priests of the temple of Aphrodite heard that such an eminent sculptor had come to their region and decided not to miss the chance - they ordered him a statue of Aphrodite.
Praxitel made two: one was naked to the waist, which did not violate the canons. BUTthe second he performed innovatively: he completely exposed the goddess. And he invited the priests to choose one of the two statues. Seeing the naked goddess, the priests were embarrassed: after all, naked Aphrodite is an unheard-of blasphemy and even blasphemy, but they did not dare to make a claim to the famous master, but simply paid and took away Aphrodite, who was dressed to the waist.
But the priests from the city of Knidos (100 km from Kos, the current Mugla) were so fascinated by the statue of naked Aphrodite that they were not afraid, they did not give a damn about the conventions and bought this statue for their temple. And they did it right! She brought unheard-of popularity to the temple and the city: people came to Knidos from all over the civilized world to admire the beautiful Aphrodite. The erudite and writer Pliny the Elder spoke of her like this: “The sculpture of Praxiteles Aphrodite of Cnidus is the best sculptural work not only of Praxiteles, but throughout the world.”
The statue of Aphrodite was made in such a way that it seemed: the living goddess of love, who was taking water procedures, was suddenly caught by unintentional witnesses. And she is embarrassed, bent over in a natural pose, wanting to cover herself. In the hand of the goddess is a cloth that serves as a towel. She descends onto a hydria with water (in fact, Praxiteles added these details so that the sculpture had additional support).
The statue is graceful, its face is spiritual and humane. She has a perfect figure and flawless features. The delightful stranger half-smiling embarrassedly, her languid gaze betrays the goddess of love in her. Head framing hair sittingmagnificent crown. The sculpture of Praxiteles was painted, which made it look like a living one. The height of the statue is about 2 meters.
This work struck the imagination of both ordinary people and statesmen, for example, the king of Bithynia Nicomedes so wanted to get the statue into his possessions that he offered the Cnidians to forgive their public debt in exchange for the statue. The Nicodians preferred to pay off the debt, but they did not give up the statue. They fell in love with her: several times the guards of the temple at night caught young men there who committed sexual misconduct, as evidenced by Lucian of Samosata.
Unfortunately, the fate of the original statue is sad: in the Byzantine era, the statue was taken to Constantinople, where it perished, either during a fire, or during one of the wars.
Only inaccurate copies have survived to our times, because Praxiteles was such a master, whose work is not easy to forge in our time. The best copies are kept in the Vatican and Munich museums, and the closest version of the torso to the original is in the Louvre.
Praxiteles sculpted his Aphrodite from nature, and Phryne, who was known at that time, posed for him.
The fate of the women of ancient Greece
Married women of ancient Hellas are hard to envy: they belonged to their husbands in soul, body and material condition, that is, they were completely dependent. Their main function was considered procreation. As Lycurgus, the legislator, wrote: “The main task of the newlyweds is to give the state he althy, strong, hardy, the best children. A young newlywed should pay close attention to his wife andreproductions. The same applies to the newlywed, especially if their children have not yet been born.”
The ancient Greek women had absolutely no rights, they were the property of men, so their main task was to serve their masters: first a father or brother, and then a husband. In schools, they were taught such things as sewing, culinary arts, playing musical instruments, dancing, managing servants and slaves. Ancient Greek women could only leave the house accompanied by either male relatives or female servants.
A married woman always had to ask her husband's permission to leave the house and spend money. In addition to serving their husbands and children, Greek women worked: they baked bread and pastries, sewed clothes, made jewelry and sold their goods in the bazaars, where, in conversations with the same housewives, they were at least a little distracted from household chores.
The Hellads were prepared for such a life from early childhood, so they did not rebel, but dutifully carried their cross. As they say, born a girl - be patient.
But there were women who did not intend to endure. These women were Athenian hetaerae.
Who are heterosexuals
Hetera, translated from ancient Greek - friend, companion. In Hellas, girls who voluntarily gave up the role of wife and mother in favor of an independent lifestyle were called getters.
Hetera should be comprehensively educated, it should be interesting with her, she should be smart: hetaeras were often asked for advice in the political spherestatesmen. Geter should take care of herself, always be beautiful and airy, she should not talk about her problems. It should be easy with her. The Athenian hetaera is a girl for a pleasant pastime, men strove for them in order to relax both in body and soul. The ancient Greeks greatly respected the getters, and the fact that the getters wanted to pay for their love - the Hellenes did not see anything reprehensible in this: after all, any person takes a fee for his time spent.
In our time, heterosexuals are compared with courtesans. But this is far from the case: a courtesan, whatever one may say, is still a dependent person. And getters were independent neither from men, nor from the society in which they lived. We can say that a courtesan is an elite prostitute, but a hetaera was still not a prostitute, because a meeting with a hetero did not always include a mandatory sexual program. Hetera herself decided whether to have sexual relations with this or that man, although she accepted the gift anyway. If you wanted to.
Hetaeras themselves chose whether they wanted to see this or that man as their admirer, while the courtesans were not given such a choice. An important feature: the getters were priestesses of the temples of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, and they gave part of their proceeds to the temples. Another nuance: in Hellas, marriages were made for love extremely rarely. Usually a girl was picked up by a groom when she was 10-12 years old and prepared for married life. Husbands often did not love their spouses: for love they had hetaerae.
Before the ancient Greek women realized that in addition to fatewives they can choose an independent lifestyle, hetaerae were slaves, usually from other countries.
The fates of hetaerae developed in different ways: some retained their independence until the end of their lives and taught girls this craft at “non-working” age. For example, Nikarete opened a hetaera school in Corinth, and Elephantis created a manual for sexual education. Some wrote philosophical works (like Cleonissa), while others got married. If a hetaera got married, she chose not a simple Athenian hard worker as her husband, but a man with a high social status, so that there would be at least some sense in losing independence.
History knows getters who married kings (Thais of Athens and Pharaoh Ptolemy I) and generals (Aspasia and Pericles). And how many hetaerae were supported by the mayors of cities, philosophers, poets, artists, orators and many other famous, very respected men, whose work we admire even today!
One of these heterosexuals was the model of Praxiteles - Phryne, which will be discussed below.
Fryna in brief
Phryne was the lover of the great sculptor Praxiteles. The real name of the Greek hetaera Phryne is Mnesarete, and Phryne's nickname hinted at the girl's unusually light skin tone, unusual for the inhabitants of those parts.
Phryna was born into a we althy family of the famous doctor Epikles, who gave his daughter an excellent education, because from childhood it was noticeable from the girl that she was not only beautiful, but also smart.
She did not want the fate of Kinder, Küche, Kirche(German - “children, kitchen, church”), so she ran away from home and went to Athens, where she became a popular hetero due to her breathtaking appearance. The growth of the Greek hetaera Phryne was not very high by today's standards - 164 cm. Bust 86 cm, waist 69 cm, and hips 93 cm.
Hetera Phryne herself chose who to show favor to and who to refuse. And she set the rate for her love as she pleased. For example, the king of Lydia lusted after her so much that he paid her a fabulous sum, and then raised taxes to close this gap in the country's budget. Phryne admired Diogenes as a philosopher so much that she did not demand payment at all.
The hetaera had a lot of fans, which allowed her to become fabulously rich: she had her own house with a swimming pool and amenities, slaves and other attributes that demonstrated her high status.
Hetera Phryne could afford to spend a decent amount on charity. For example, she suggested that the inhabitants of the city of Thebes reconstruct the walls of the city. But on one condition: they had to place a sign in a conspicuous place: "Alexander (Macedonian) destroyed, and Phryne restored." The Thebans rejected the idea because they didn't like the way her money was made.
When Phryne went out into the city on business, she dressed more than modestly so as not to attract special attention to herself. But a legend has come down to our times about how once Phryne changed her rule, and at the Poseidon festival she appeared completely naked. With this demarche, she challenged Aphrodite herself - the goddesslove.
The plot was captured on a canvas called "Phryne at the Poseidon Festival" by Henryk Semiradsky, an academic artist.
Phryne and Xenocrates
It's hard to believe, but in Athens there was a man who didn't care about Phryne's charms. It was the philosopher Xenocrates (famous for first dividing philosophy into logic, ethics and physics).
This serious husband did not pay attention to women, he had no time for stupid things. He directed Plato's Academy.
Once in a company discussing the strict nature of the philosopher, Phryne said that she could seduce this respected scholar, and even made a bet. At the next party, Xantip was seated next to Phryne and she started spinning him.
The philosopher was a he althy man of a traditional orientation, but thanks to his willpower he did not succumb to the charms of the hetaera, despite her rather frank tricks. Discouraged, Phryne told the debaters: “I promised to awaken feelings in a person, and not in a piece of marble!” and did not pay the lost money.
Phryne and Praxiteles
Praxitel was madly in love with a beautiful young girl. When he sculpted his Aphrodites, he saw Phryne as his model, and only her alone.
The young hetaera was playful and loved to play a little joke on her lover. Once Phryne asked Praxiteles a question which of his works he considers the most successful, but the sculptor declined to answer. Then the hetaera persuaded the servant, he ran into the house and began to shout that in the workshopPraxiteles a fire broke out. The sculptor clutched his head and sadly exclaimed: “Ah, my Satyr and Eros are gone!” Laughing and reassuring Praxiteles, the model said that this was a joke, she just really wanted to find out what kind of work he values \u200b\u200bmost of all. To celebrate, the sculptor presented one of the statues of his choice to his beloved hetaira. She took the statue of Eros and gave it to the temple of Eros, which was located in her hometown of Thespia.
Phryne and the court
In the biography of the model Phryne, not everything was smooth. One day she had to stand trial. The orator Evfiy was crazy about the hetaera, even shaved off his beard to look younger, but she laughed and rejected his claims. Then he was deeply offended and sued Phryne.
The very famous statue of Aphrodite of Cnidus served as the reason for the trial: in ancient Greece, depicting the gods naked was blasphemy, it was equated with murder. The orator Hyperides acted as a lawyer for the hetaera Phryne. He really counted on the girl's favor in case of a positive outcome in court.
In court, Evfiy said that although Phryne is a courtesan, she is not just a dissolute woman who embarrasses both fledgling youths and respectable husbands with her appearance. In addition, she is an unheard-of blasphemer who, out of vanity, competes in beauty with Aphrodite herself. Hyperides defended the girl with speeches that Phryne was a diligent priestess of the cult of Aphrodite and Eros, and her whole life was a confirmation of this service.
During the debate, Evfiy accused Praxiteles and Apelles as accomplices. Business took a badturnover.
When Hyperides had almost no arguments left, he simply approached Phryne and pulled off her clothes. Hetera rose before the court in her original beauty. The judges and spectators present at the trial froze in mute admiration. And then they acquitted the hetera, because according to the ancient Greek concept of kalogatia, a beautiful person cannot be a villain. And Evfiy was punished with a large fine for a slander.
This scene was captured in his painting Phryne before the Areopagus by Jean-Leon Gerome.
The artist used the word "Areopagus", apparently, for a red word, because in fact the Areopagus judged only for murders, and for blasphemy they tried in Heliei - a jury trial.
Phryna and other artists
Hetera Phryne posed not only for Praxiteles, but also for the famous artist Apelles, who was a friend of Alexander the Great. This union gave the whole world the fresco "Aphrodite Anadyomene".
The plot of the fresco: Gaia, tired of her husband's betrayals, complained to her son Kronos about the pangs of jealousy, and he took it and castrated his father with a sickle. And he threw the severed genitals of the adulterer into the sea. The blood turned into sea foam and from it the goddess of love Aphrodite was born, who reached the shore on a huge sea shell.
The fresco, unfortunately, has not survived, but its alleged copy has survived to this day.
Famous artists of all times often return to the plot of this legend. For example, Botticelli, Boucher, Jean-Leon Gerome, Cabanel, Bouguereau, Redon, and manyothers.
Hetera Phryne lived to a respectable age, she was rich, revered, famous. After her death, her former lover Praxiteles made another statue in memory of Phryne. It was installed in Delphi.
Marble Phryne, decorated with gold, was installed between the statues of the kings. A tablet was attached to the pedestal, on which they wrote: "Phryna of Thespiae, daughter of Epikles." This outraged the cynic Crates, who said that this statue was nothing more than a monument to debauchery. The social status of the hetaera was much lower than the royal one, so some citizens were annoyed by the location of the statue of the hetaera in such a company.
Poems, legends, books were written about Phryne, many famous artists devoted many paintings to her. In the 80s of the last century, the image of Phryne as Aphrodite was referred to by the impressionist artist Salvador Dali when he selected the design for a perfume bottle with his name on it.
The legend of Phryne has been alive for more than 4,000 years and this is not the limit.
Here was a woman in whom one of the best sculptors of the planet saw the living embodiment of the goddess of love Aphrodite.
