During this period, usages alien to the administrative character of the Agora are rare and are limited to certain residences on the edges of the area defined as the Agora in the 5th cent. BC; even rarer are the workshops. Numerous finds testify to the Agora’s role as an administrative centre: wares bearing the inscription ΔΕ(ΜΟΣΙΟΣ) (=public) which also served as official units for measuring capacity, official standards of measurement, clepsydrae, tablets containing names of judges, tablets recording horsemen and horses, katadesmoi (magical texts which ‘bind’ the practitioner's enemies preventing them from harming him or allowing him to cause harm to them), potsherds used in ostracism procedures.
There are also increasing numbers of monumental artworks (sculptures and metalwork), creations of famous masters, like Pheidias, Agorakritos, but also of nameless, but not less able, artists. The masterpiece of this period is a bronze head of the goddess Nike, which dates to c.425 BC and undoubtedly originates from a temple. Originally, this artefact was gilded and bore insert eyes of precious or semiprecious stones.
Another extremely important sculpture is the marble head of a female divinity, which, based on the results of its stylistic comparison with Artemis of the Parthenon’s eastern frieze, is attributed to one of the sculptors working on the decoration of the supreme Athenian monument. The artwork is dated to 440-420 BC, and represents one of the most important authentic Classical sculptures discovered in the Agora.
For historical reasons, very important are the dozens fragmentary Hermae unearthed in the Agora area, around the Stoa Basileios and the Stoa Poikile, and date between the 5th cent BC and the 2nd cent. AD. The popularity of the Hermaic stele (a pillar culminating in a bust of the god Hermes, with the male genitals depicted clearly at its base), is partly due to the fact that Cimon, after his victory over the Persians in Eion of Thrace, received permission to erect three such stelae in the Agora area. The mutilation of the Agora Hermae in 415 BC, threw the Athenian state in a deep crisis, which eventually lead to the conviction of a group of young men belonging to the ‘golden generation’ of the city's aristocracy, and, above all, to Alcibiades' ostracism.
The devotional statue of Apollo Patroos, dating to the 4th cent. BC, is the most widely known original work extant today. This particular piece is mentioned by Pausanias and the excavators have correlated it with a large headless dressed statue kept in the Museum of Athens. It survives to a height of 2.54 m. The god was depicted dressed in a sumptuous tunic and holding a lyre. Another sculpture of a divinity from roughly the same period is a colossal statue of a female figure, considered allegorical, possibly of Themis, although the erroneous suggestion that it represented Democracy had been put forward previously. This is an artwork of exquisite craftsmanship, which, unfortunately, survives in a fragmentary condition.
The numerous monuments of the Agora were decorated with architectural sculptures. From the Hephaesteion only some of the metopes survive in a poor condition. Equally fragmentary are the sculptures from the Temple of Ares, which was relocated to the Agora in the 1st cent. BC. The most beautiful architectural sculptures unearthed in the Agora come from the acroteria of the Stoa of Zeus Eleutherios. A head of Nike from the late 5th cent. BC, and the splendid torso of another Nike statue with flowing garments survive in a comparatively good condition, the latter unfortunately missing its head.
The reliefs that survive from the Agora are relatively few, but are exceptionally interesting. A relief statue base from the 4th cent. BC, possibly of votive offering after a victory, preserves a symbolic representation of an apobatic contest: this was a competition in which all the Athenian phylae (=tribes) participated and was held in the Agora area in the context of the Great Panathenaea. Another interesting piece is a relief decorating a decree stele against the tyranny of 337/336 BC. The demos of Athens is represented as an enthroned bearded man being crowned by the personification of Democracy (a standing cloaked woman).
There also many pieces of miniature-art. Among these, extraordinary is an ivory figurine depicting Apollo, a 4th cent. BC artwork.
The 5th cent. BC pottery differs from that of the Archaic period. Dominant are the black glazed crude everyday ware; their use could have been public or private. Painted vases are less widespread and appear mostly in the apothetes (repositories) of residences and temples. A large number of pottery and other finds come from the enclosure next to the crossroads. Some of the red figure wares of this period are of particular interest, as they depict rituals which might have taken place in the Agora, like the torch race in honour of Hephaestus.
ILLUSTRATIONS
1. Agora Museum. Pottery shards bearing the names of Aristeides, Themistocles, Cimon and Pericles. 5th cent. BC (Lang, M., The Athenian Citizen. Democracy in the Athenian Agora, Princeton 2004, p. 20, fig. 21).
2. Agora Museum. Clepsydra. 5th cent. BC (Lang, M., The Athenian Citizen. Democracy in the Athenian Agora, Princeton 2004, p. 25, fig. 29).
3. Agora Museum B 30. Bronze head of Nike. 425 BC. (Camp, plate ΙΙΙ).
4. Agora Museum S 2094. Marble head of a female divinity. 440-420 BC. Bol, P.C. et al., Die Geschichte der antiken Bildhauerkunst II. Klassische Plastik (Mainz 2004), fig. 117. Reeder, E., Pandora. Women in Classical Greece (Baltimore 1995), n° 11.
5. Agora Museum. S 2452. Marble head from a Hermaic stele of the 5th cent. BC, discovered in the enclosure by the crossroads. Camp, p. 99, fig. 49).
6. Agora Museum S 2154. Devotional statue of Apollo Patroos, a work of Euphranor. 4th cent. BC. (Wycherley, Thompson, pl. 69)
7. Agora Museum S 2370. Colossal statue of a female figure, possibly of Themis. It was placed in front of the Stoa Basileios around 330 BC (Camp, p. 131, fig. 78).
8. Agora Museum S 373. Marble head of Nike from the acroterion of the Stoa of Zeus Eleutherios. 5th cent. BC. (Wycherley, Thompson, pl. 51c).
9. Agora Museum S 312. Marble acroterion in the form of Nike from the Stoa of Zeus Eleutherios. 5th cent. BC. (Wycherley, Thompson, pl. 52).
10. Agora Museum S 399. Marble pediment bearing a relief depiction of a charioteer Nike on a chariot with an apobate. 5th cent. BC. (Wycherley, Thompson, pl. 66a).
11. Agora Museum Ι 6524. Relief decorated decree stele depicting Democracy crowning the Demos. The decree contained therein is against the tyranny. 336 BC. (Lang, M., The Athenian Citizen. Democracy in the Athenian Agora, Princeton 2004, p. 18, fig. 29. / Wycherley, Thompson, pl. 53a).
12. Agora Museum. Ivory figurine of an athlete. 4th cent. BC.
13. Agora Museum. Black glazed kylix. Its stem bears the inscription ΔΕ, that is ΔΕ(ΜΟΣΙΟΝ) (=public). (Lang, M., The Athenian Citizen. Democracy in the Athenian Agora, Princeton 2004, p.15, fig. 16.
14. Agora Museum P 23850. Red figure chous depicting a garlanded youth leading a horse. Late 5th cent. BC. Neils, J., Tracy, St. V., The Games at Athens, Princeton 2003, p. 23, fig. 21.
15. Agora Museum P 28245. Red figure chous depicting a torch race. Late 5th cent. BC. Neils, J., Tracy, St. V., The Games at Athens, Princeton 2003, p. 26, fig. 26.
