Polis, square and portrait. The Effigy Statues on the Agora of Athens in the Late Hellenistic and Imperial Periods (86 BC - 267 AD)

short text

In addition to architectural monuments, the public spaces of Greek cities were characterized by statuary monuments, which are ultimately to be seen as documents and media of the visual relationship between the various social subjects inside and outside the city. This work deals with the statuary images on the Agora of Athens, the political, social and economic center of the Attic polis under Roman rule (86 BC - 267 AD), which have been handed down archaeologically and through literary and epigraphic evidence. .

Through a diachronic and systematic analysis of the material, on the one hand breaks and continuities in the statuary arrangement of the square are recorded, on the other hand some basic aspects such as actors, practices, forms and materials of the statuary monuments in the public space of the square are explained and connected with each other. The study shows that topographical, thematic and thematic connections with the old monuments and cults of the square led to the honoring of the new honorands in traditional forms of representation and thus to the integration of the new sitters into the historical tradition of the agora and the polis.

Tags: area planning, polis, agora, Athens, public spaces, portrait statues, archaeology, Hellenism, imperial times, representation of power.

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