In an unpublished paper by my former teacher, Dr. Alfred Emerson, which was read by Professor D. M. Robinson before the Archæological Institute of America at its Christmas meeting in Providence in 1910, and entitled _The Case of Kyniska_,[1897] the argument was made that the chariot was in miniature; that the statue of Kyniska was a portrait, because of the wording of the recovered epigram; and, lastly that the smallest of the so-called bronze dancers from the villa of the Pisos in Herculaneum, now in Naples, is a late reproduction of the statue at Olympia by Apellas. Emerson thinks that Pliny no doubt often visited the villa and may well have had these statues in mind when he mentioned Apellas as the author of several statues of women adorning themselves.[1898]
The monument erected by Hiero, son of Deinomenes and brother and successor of king Gelo at Syracuse, who won two horse-races and a four-horse chariot victory at Olympia in Ols. 76, 77, 78 (= 476-468 B. C.),[1899] consisted of a bronze chariot, on which the charioteer was mounted, and on either side a race-horse with a jockey on each. Onatas made the chariot (and possibly the statue of the driver), while Kalamis sculptured the horses and jockeys. Such a division among sculptors was not uncommon at Olympia. Thus the Aeginetan artist Simon and the Argive Dionysios made a group in common for Phormis, which we have already mentioned, consisting of two horses and two charioteers.[1900] The Chian Pantias and the Aeginetan Philotimos made a group in common for Xenombrotos of Kos, victor in horse-racing, and for his son, the boy boxer Xenodikos, which consisted of statues of the man and the boy on horseback.[1901] Pliny mentions a four-horse chariot-group for which the elder Praxiteles made the charioteer and Kalamis the chariot, adding that Praxiteles did this out of kindness, not wishing it to be thought that Kalamis had failed in representing the man after succeeding in representing the horses.[1902]
In some of the Olympic chariot-groups doubtless the charioteer was represented at the moment of entering the chariot or already in it. Sometimes a figure of Nike took the place of the charioteer, in order that the victor’s exploit might be more exalted. Thus Pausanias, in mentioning the bronze chariot of Kratisthenes of Kyrene by Pythagoras of Rhegion,[1903] says that statues of Nike and Kratisthenes himself are mounted upon the car. The Nike in some cases was replaced by the figure of a young maiden, who stood beside the victor, as in the cases of the Elean Timon[1904] and the Macedonian Lampos.[1905] Pliny notes a similar example in reference to the chariot of Teisikrates, a Delphian victor in the two-horse chariot-race.[1906] The maiden in all these cases may have been merely a Nike personified or a mortal.[1907] Pliny records that the painter Nikomachos, son and pupil of Aristeides, painted a _Victoria quadrigam in sublime rapiens_.[1908] The figure of Nike appears often on reliefs. Thus on a terra-cotta sarcophagus from Klazomenai we see a two-horse chariot driven by a boy, while alongside is a winged female figure—Iris or Nike—mounting it.[1909] The moment of victory is shown on an Attic marble votive relief representing a four-horse chariot, now in the British Museum. Here a figure of Nike is represented as floating in the air and extending a wreath (now wanting) towards the head of the charioteer, who is draped with a tunic girdled at the waist, as he mounts the car. If the charioteer in this relief is a female (which is doubtful), it may he the personification of the city to which the winner belongs.[1910] On a votive relief in Athens a horse is represented as being crowned by Nike.[1911] On a relief in Madrid Nike is represented as driving a chariot.[1912] A quadriga with a female figure, apparently Nike, appears on a relief dedicated to Hermes and the Nymphs, which was found in Phaleron.[1913] Doubtless some of the chariot-groups at Olympia represented movement—the start, the course, or the end of the race—as do these and similar reliefs.[1914] We should add that the figure of Nike was not confined to equestrian monuments. On the Ficoroni cista in Rome is represented the boxing match between Polydeukes and Amykos among the Bebrykes. In the centre we see Amykos hanged to a tree by the hands, while to the right stands Athena, and above her Nike is flying with a crown and fillet of victory for Polydeukes.[1915]