Word: thracians
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...church but the strident demands of local Roman politics, with its aristocratic, warring families, that determined their selection. No fewer than 205 of them were Italians. The 58 exceptions were 15 Greeks, 15 Frenchmen, six Germans, six Syrians, three North Africans, three Spaniards, two Dalmatians, two Goths, a Thracian, an Englishman, a Portuguese, a Dutchman, one of unknown nationality-and now a Pole...
...Thracian men were famed for their martial valor over centuries--even the Romans admired their bravery and preferred them as gladiators (Spartacus was Thracian). Yet there was more to them than banditry alone, as this range of art works dating from around the 16th century B.C. to the 2nd century A.D. proves. For Thrace was the land whence came Orpheus, mythical musician-king who enchanted the most ferocious beasts and defied Pluto, the king of the underworld; it was the country where the Horseman--a god combining aspects of Apollo, Dionysos and Asclepius--was at once the object of popular...
...example, a mid-fifth century silver-gilt plaque of Nike, the Victory Goddess, from the Golyamata mound at Douvanli, is totally different in spirit from the famous Grecian golden Nike earring on permanent display in the museum. The Thracian piece is, first of all, virtually two dimensional by its nature, whereas the Greek version is a sculpture in miniature. Yet the Thracian Nike seems solid, almost archaic when compared with the delicacy and grace of the Athena Nike...
However, there is another object in the museum demonstrating that by 380-350 B.C. Thracian craftsmen could produce a similarly ornamental piece of jewelry. From a tomb at Urasta came a pair of gold earrings complete with rosettes, tendrils, and beads suspended--doubtless they were too heavy to wear every day (they were five cm. long)--but they still conjure up images of perfumed favorites in whispering silk: the same kind of romanticized seraglio as Ingres depicted...
...other things that invite one, but perhaps the gold and silver rhyta are the highlight of the show. These are drinking horns in the shape of animal or human heads,and they were created in the 6th and 5th centuries B.C. when Greek influence on Thracian art was strongest. One golden rhyton is decorated with reliefs of Hera, Artemis and Apollo around the rim and a billy goat at the base--the wine gushes from a spout in the goat's chest so one has to drain it all down at once...