Polygnotos’ Cuirasses in theIliupersis: A Study of the Representation of the Past in Fifth-Century ʙᴄᴇ Greek Art

Abstract

This article focuses on the images of the cuirasses from Polygnotos’ lost painting, the Iliupersis. I argue, based on a scrupulous reading of Pausanias’ detailed recreation of the painting, that Polygnotos painted two different types of body armour in his painting. One is the bronze bell cuirass, an old-fashioned panoply item in his day, and the second is the contemporary composite corselet. The visual juxtaposition of the anachronistic and the contemporary panoply items is intentional. It enabled Polygnotos to add complexity to his painting and to compel the viewer to historical awareness. Similar visual juxtaposition occurs also in vase paintings, proving that this visual practice is not an isolated, idiosyncratic creation, but rather a visual manifestation of the way the Greeks perceived and presented their past.