부산대학교 도서관

In 1962 B. B. Shefton shed much light on the iconography of the centauromachy at the feast, and in 1972 J. P. Barron shone more light on the relationship of this iconography to the lost painting of this subject in the Theseion. Barron convincingly argued, from the evidence of early classical vase paintings and the west pediment at Olympia, that the mural painting in the Theseion was the source of this new theme, the misbehaviour of the centaurs at the wedding feast of Peirithoos, and that it was painted between 478 and 470 B.C. He further suggested that the composition was on more than one level, that it showed both the brawl at the banquet and the pitched battle outside, that the centrepiece of the scene was a pair of figures fighting back to back, and that an axe-swinger was present, among other things.Most of these inferences seem sound, and yet it is as difficult to visualise what the painting looked like as when Robert in 1895 suggested that the fragments of a krater in Berlin reflected the centre of the composition. These fragments seem to fit Barron's criteria as well as anything else, for the composition is on several levels, two heroes fight back to back, the one on the left swings an axe, and at his feet lies the tail of a centaur, which Robert (with more optimism than proof, I think) considered to be a centaur already killed; there is even a hint of the outdoor conflict. Barron does not, however, revive Robert's suggestion—wisely, I believe—nor does he offer another. Nevertheless I think it might be worthwhile to return to the problem of what the centre of this lost mural painting may have looked like and consider why it remains so persistently elusive.