Marble sphinx on a cavetto capital

Marble sphinx on a cavetto capital

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Inscribed on the plinth, I am the monument of [...]linos This sphinx and capital once crowned the tall grave shaft of a youth or man named Philinos or Thalinos. They belong to the earliest type of grave stele produced in Attica during the sixth century B.C. Stylistically, the sphinx is related to such early statues as the kouros (youth) displayed in the gallery to your left. It has the same four-sided structure with grooved indications of anatomical forms and large, flat, stylized features. In the early Archaic period, Greek sculptors learned much from the Egyptians about carving large-scale stone monuments. The simple concave form of this capital imitates the cavetto molding often found in Egyptian architecture.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Marble sphinx on a cavetto capitalMarble sphinx on a cavetto capitalMarble sphinx on a cavetto capitalMarble sphinx on a cavetto capitalMarble sphinx on a cavetto capital

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.