Head of horse from the chariot of the moon-goddess Selene. East pediment of the Parthenon, 5th century BC. British Museum. London
The horse (“hippos”) was first domesticated in what is now Kazakhstan five thousand years ago and eight breeds were cultivated in Ancient Greece. Some areas of the Greek world were particularly famed for their horsemanship, for example Thessaly. Horses represented wealth and status as well as being integral to a thriving economy and an essential part of warfare.
A Greek Bronze Figure of a Horse, Geometric Period, circa 8th century B.C.
The cost of purchasing and keeping a horse was, as now, extremely expensive, which restricted their use to the wealthy land-owning elite, who made up a relatively tiny percent of the population. In peacetime, these wealthy individuals practised hunting and racing and, during periods of war, engaged in cavalry service.The fourth century historian and philosopher Xenophon’s two treatises on the care and training of horses perfectly capture this culture’s deep fascination with the art of horsemanship. The horse’s association with the elite meant that the animal became a symbol of wealth and status.
Two of the Horses of Marble quadriga (four-horse chariot), ‘ex voto’ of 570 BCE. The New Acropolis Museum
The horse’s long affiliation with gods and heroes in Greek mythology no doubt also fostered a special respect and admiration for this remarkable creature in the minds of “ordinary” Greeks.
Poseidon riding on a hippocamp (half winged horse, half sea serpent) alongside dolphins
The god Poseidon was credited with creating the first horse and Athena patron goddess of Athens with taming it by discovering the reins and bit, thus rendering it suitable for human service for the first time. Athena was also the inspiration behind the cunning Greeks’ infamous Trojan Horse which ultimately led to their victory at the Battle of Troy.
Terracotta kylix (drinking cup) – Attributed to the Amasis Painter – The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
The subject is drawn from book 13 of Homer’s Iliad. Poseidon, seeing the Greeks hard-pressed, decided to help renew their valor. At his underwater palace, he ordered his chariot prepared so that he could ride to their aid. On one side of this cup, an atmosphere of feverish excitement reigns in the stables as grooms attempt to soothe four high-strung horses tethered to columns. Supernatural forces seem to have been unleashed: tiny figures race over the horses’ backs and swing down from the architectural frieze above. On the other side of the cup, Poseidon, carrying a trident, urges on the Greek heroes.
Giovanni Tiepolo’s The Procession of the Trojan Horse Into Troy, 1760Automedon and the Horses of Achilles, Henri Alexandre Georges Regnault, 1868
In Homer’s Iliad, horses drive the chariots of the heroes and are praised for their swiftness and beautiful coats. They are often depicted as having special relationships with their owners, like Achilles and his immortal horses, Balius and Xanthus. In the Iliad, it is told how, when Patroclus was killed in battle, Xanthus and Balius stood motionless on the field of battle, and wept, yet when Achilles rebuked Xanthus for letting Patroklus get slain, Hera granted the horse human speech to deliver to Achilles a warning about his own fate.
The education of Achilles by the centaur Chiron. 1782 by Jean Baptiste Regnault
Bellerophon riding Pegasus
Other horses connected with the divine and endowed with special powers include Cheiron, a centaur, son of Kronos who acted as Achilles’ tutor, and Pegasus the winged horse, offspring of Poseidon and Medusa. He was later transformed by Zeus into the constellation Pegasus.
Ancient Greek Olympic horse racing was extremely dangerous since jockeys rode with no saddles, stirrups, horseshoes, or safety equipment.
Horses played a central role in the great civic festivals in the ancient world, such as the Panathenaic Games in Athens and the Olympic games at Olympos, where they took part in chariot races and single horse races. The fifth century Theban lyric poet Pindar immortalises the victories of the horses and riders at the Isthmian, Olympian, Pythian and Neman Greek games in his epinicean odes.
Jockey’ of Artemision, 140 BC – National Archaeological Museum AthensSt Mark’s Basilica in Venice… their necks somewhat curved as if they eyed each other as they raced round the last lap …“Horses of Saint Mark” – “Triumphal Quadriga”, attributed to the 4th century BC Greek sculptor Lysippos
Today, these horses can be seen inside Saint Mark’s Basilica in Venice. When they came to Venice in 1254 they were placed on the front façade of the basilica, in pairs above the central portal. Given concern for their continued preservation because of increasing levels of air pollution, the horses were taken down and placed inside the church in the 1980s and replaced with replicas.
Grave stele of Dexileos. Marble funerary stele dated to 394-393 B.C. ARCHAEOLOGICAL MUSEUM OF KERAMEIKOS
Athenian enthusiasm for the horse was also expressed in the many civic and religious buildings that were covered with paintings and sculptures of riders and battle scenes. Such art and architecture often portrayed the prowess of the Greek warrior in battle, not just during the archaic period but also in the classical and Hellenistic ages, for example, the grave stele of Dexileos (394/3 BC) which shows the young cavalryman in battle on a rearing horse with the enemy cowering beneath him.
Theophilos Chatzimichail – Alexander the Great, about 1900 – Athens National Historical Museum
Great Alexander on his horse Voukefalas, photo from Thessaloniki, Greece
Relief from Alexander’s sarcophagus, 4th century BC – Istanbul Archeological Museum
The Battle of Issus shown on the Alexander Mosaic (c 100 BC), in Pompeii
Similarly represented are depictions of Alexander the Great and his famous horse Bucephalos, like that of the pair riding into battle in the Alexander Mosaic at the House of the Faun, Pompeii. In this famous mosaic, Alexander the Great is defeating the Persian king: while Darius rides in a chariot, Alexander does away with such comforts and is mounted on his horse. His freedom and strength as a rider defeat the chariot-bound Darius. Alexander, here, is the centaur.
Cavalry from the Parthenon Frieze, West II, 2–3, British Museum
Perhaps most famous in its depiction of horses is the Parthenon. The south and west friezes depict the common motif of the horse rearing over a fallen enemy, in preparation for battle and in procession, as well as the beautifully and expressively carved horse head of Selene on the East Pediment.
Marble relief, Slab XXXVII from the North Frieze of the Parthenon: procession of horse-drawn chariots, British Museum, London
You can see this in the Parthenon sculptures at the British Museum in London. The Parthenon was built at a time of war between Greek cities and the Persian Empire. Powerful carvings of humans fighting centaurs depict this as a war between reason and savagery, with centaurs as the wild enemies of Athenian civilisation.
Detail of a frieze from the Parthenon
Horses are not always associated with war in art. While some images from the Parthenon show centaurs raging, the main frieze portrays young Athenian men proudly riding in a cavalcade. These horses are poised between the energy of their wild inheritance, and the elegance of a tamed creature. The confidence of the riders is an image of civilisation. The taming of horses is one of art’s oldest signifiers of beauty, yet their original wildness also feeds visions of raw power.
Detail of a frieze from the Parthenon
The multifarious depictions of the horse on this magnificent monument demonstrate their significance in war and the centrality of this creature in the civic, religious and economic life of the city.
Horse head sculpture from The Parthenon in Greece. These beautiful marble sculptures were stolen by Lord Elgin in 1803. They now reside at the British Museum and Greece wants them back!
Head of a horse of Selene from the east pediment of the Parthenon. This is perhaps the most famous and best loved of all the sculptures of the Parthenon. It captures the very essence of the stress felt by a beast that has spent the night drawing the chariot of the Moon across the sky. As the unseen vehicle was shown sinking low in the west, the horse pins back its ears, the jaw gapes, the nostrils flare, the eyes bulge, veins stand out and the flesh seems spare and taut over the flat plate of the cheek bone.
Horse – Athens, Acropolis Museum
Marble fragment of an Athenian Horse from Greece’s Golden Age..500 BC – 300 BC
Ancient Greek Horse Head, 350 b.c. Florence archeological museum
Head of a horse, around 515 BC marble, Attic workshop, Museo Nacional del Prado
The ancient Athenians considered most everyone else barbarians, and that snobbery has trickled down to us through the eons. When we think of Greek civilization, we think of the Golden Age of Athens in the 5th century B.C., of Aeschylus and Sophocles, and statesmen such as Pericles ~ in his funeral oration: “We throw open our city to the world, and never by alien acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing, although the eyes of an enemy may occasionally profit by our liberality. . . . ”
ART Pathos ∙ Τέχνης συγκίνησις® 