Wine jug depicting two athletes

This exquisitely ornate vase depicts a scene from everyday life in Athens, with two athletes enjoying a rest after their training session. At the same time we are given a fascinating insight into the society of the day. The painter has expertly planned his small-scale depiction, which shows two adult athletes using a curved metal implement known as a strigil to scrape off perspiration, sand and oil after their training session. He has cleverly used the natural curvature of the jug to make the figures which frame the scene seem almost three-dimensional. The movements of their naked bodies direct our attention towards the centre of the image, where we see a young boy, also naked, who dominates the image even though he is the smallest figure. His central place in the composition is surprising, not just because of his young age and small stature but because his social status is much lower than that of the two adults. Indeed,both athletes would have been from the upper class in Athens, where the jug was made. Regular training at a palaestra kept them prepared for battle and also allowed them to fulfil the Greek ideal of manhood, which, alongside moral integrity also prescribed a beautiful and harmonious physique, true to the motto kalos kai agathos (beautiful in mind and body). Their faces, too, are idealised accordingly. By contrast, the young boy, who holds an ointment flask in his left hand, can probably be identified as a slave who works at the palaestra. This is suggested not only by the context of the scene, but by the fact that his face has not been idealised by the painter, thus making plain his non-Greek origin. He cannot look forward, therefore, to a brilliant career in politics or the military; on the contrary, as an unfree man of foreign birth, he will be excluded from political life in Athenian democracy. Quite different prospects await the young man commemorated in the inscription between the two athletes. The vessel is dedicated to “Euaion, the beautiful son of Aeschylus”. Euaion is praised, therefore, for his beauty, which conforms to the Greek aesthetic ideals, while the mention of his father, probably the famous poet Aeschylus, emphasises his legitimate descent, which allows him to claim the complete set of civic rights. (ed)

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