By the beginning of the fifth century B. C., if not earlier, boxers were represented in violent motion, as we saw in the case of the statue of the boy boxer Glaukos, by the Aeginetan sculptor Glaukias,[1712] represented in the act of sparring (σκιαμαχῶν). Whether he was represented as facing an imaginary antagonist or as merely punching a bag we can not say, though the latter seems the more probable. The motive is depicted in many art works, notably in the figure of a youth punching a bag which hangs from a tree on the Ficoroni cista in the Museo Kircheriano, Rome,[1713] and in that of another represented on the so-called Peter cista in the Museo Gregoriano Etrusco of the Vatican, whose engraved scenes show exercises of the palæstra.[1714] The same motive is seen also in a statuette in the Museo Chiaramonti of the Vatican, which is proved to be that of a boy boxer by the glove on the right hand.[1715] Here the boy is represented with the right foot far advanced and rising on the toes of both feet, the right shoulder being drawn back, the right forearm raised, and the left extended forwards. The marble torso of a copy of the same original on a large scale is in Berlin.[1716] While Amelung believes that the original of both statuette and torso was a bronze of the second half of the fourth century B. C., Furtwaengler thought that the torso went back to the severe style of the fifth century, and that this original once stood in Olympia, where it might have served as the inspiration for a carelessly worked bronze statuette of a boxer found there, which repeats the motive of the torso and similarly belongs to the fifth century B. C. (Fig. 2).[1717] The Olympia statuette also has the right foot advanced, the upper part of the body leans backward, and the left arm with open palm is outstretched for defense, while the right with balled fist is held up ready to strike. It certainly is a votive offering of an Olympic victor—doubtless one of the small reductions, which were not uncommonly erected for economy’s sake.[1718] Whether the Aeginetan Glaukias also made victor statues in repose is doubtful.
Waldstein, on insufficient grounds, has argued that the so-called _Strangford Apollo_ in the British Museum (Fig. 14)[1719] is a copy of the statue at Olympia of the famous Thasian boxer and pancratiast Theagenes by Glaukias. Its close observation of nature finds its analogy in the statues of the Aeginetan pediment groups (see Figs. 20, 21). The statue of the boy boxer Athenaios of Ephesos, by an unknown sculptor, was represented as lunging at his adversary, as we see from the footmarks on the recovered base. The left foot was advanced and turned outwards, while the right one touched the ground only with the toes.[1720] Similarly the statue of the boxer Damoxenidas by Nikodamos of Arkadia was represented as about to strike. On its recovered base the left foot stood solidly upon the ground, while the right foot was drawn back and touched the ground only with the toes—if we judge rightly from the size of the missing part of the stone.[1721] The statue of the Ionian boxer Epitherses by Pythokritos of Rhodes seems to have had but one foot flat upon the ground, and consequently must have been represented in motion, though we are not sure of the position of the other, since one stone of the base is missing.[1722]