Studia Hercynia (Sep 2022)
The hidden treasure of Dionysus. Small portraits from eastern Adriatic stamnoid situlae
Abstract
The paper presents two decorative attachments depicting Sileni from stamnoid situlae from the eastern Adriatic sites of Karin and Budva. Through formal typological classification, stylistic and comparative analysis within the broader Late Classical and Early Hellenistic art of the Mediterranean, the ‘Adriatic’ Si leni are interpreted in terms of the miniature portrait art of that time, which had a decorative expression and aesthetic value on a lavish functional object such as the stamnoid situla. As visual art is particularly stimulating and evocative, these Sileni represented an iconographically clear message as a metaphor or a metaphor as a message. The artistic striving for recognition, idealizing or caricaturing and emphasizing the emotional state are some aspects that address the portraits of the presented Sileni. Even though every reading is a subjective act, it is an idealised artistic convention of a specific place and time, with a precise mythological and cultural historical background of the remarkable toreutic achievements. It has been im pressive and essential to observers in the past, which is also evident from their prevalence in a wide variety of ‘Old World’ cultural communities.
