Figures in Motion: An Ionian Perspective on the Severe Style

Abstract

A re-examination of three marble sculpture fragments from Miletos and their dating provides the catalyst for a revised approach to the source of the Severe Style both in chronological and geographical terms. A number of evidential threads are assembled to demonstrate the likelihood that the Severe Style has its origins in an earlier artistic milieu than usually assumed, i.e. before 494 bc, with Ionian workshops playing an equal if not leading role to Attic ones in its creation. It is argued that the Severe Style should not be considered an Athenian artistic response to the trauma of the Persian Wars, produced in a thunderbolt of inspiration around 480 bc. Instead the mechanisms of innovation for classical art should be sought elsewhere, with the shift from Archaic and Classical styles better conceived as a slower process with no epochal thresholds and the Severe Style's association with Athens a result of the city's subsequent successful cultural propaganda.