[Illustration: FIG. 54.—Boxing Scenes. From a r.-f. Kylix by Douris. British Museum, London.]
[Illustration: FIG. 55.—Boxing and Pankration Scenes. From a r.-f. Kylix. British Museum, London.]
[Illustration: FIG. 56.—Boxing Scene. From a b.-f. Panathenaic Panel-Amphora. University of Pennsylvania Museum, Philadelphia.]
[Illustration: FIG. 57.—Statue of a Boxer, from Sorrento. By Koblanos of Aphrodisias. Museum of Naples.]
We may infer how a Polykleitan statue of a boxer at rest looked, from the Roman copy of one in Kassel.[1706] Here a youth just out of boyhood is represented as standing with the weight of the body resting upon the right leg and the head turned to the right. The forearms are covered with gloves, the right fist being raised for attack and the left for defense. Another marble statue, representing a boxer in repose, was found in a fragmentary condition in Sorrento in 1888, and is now in the National Museum at Naples (Fig. 57).[1707] It is inscribed as the work of Koblanos of Aphrodisias in Karia, whom we know as a copyist of the first century A. D., and who was active in reproducing Greek works for the Roman market.[1708] The body forms are too badly injured for us accurately to date the original from which this copy was made, but the head gives us the clue, as its style appears to be a connecting link between that of the seated statue of _Herakles_, in the Palazzo Altemps in Rome[1709] and the Munich _Oil-pourer_ (Pl. 11),[1710] as it shows affinity to both. Though Sogliano referred it to the school of Lysippos and Juethner to the beginning of the fourth century B. C., it shows indubitable Myronian characteristics and may have been the work of Myron’s pupil Lykios, who is known to us as an athlete sculptor.[1711] In this statue the youth is resting his weight on his right leg, the left, with full sole on the ground, being turned to one side. The left forearm is extended outwards and to the side, the head leaning toward the right leg—in other words, the athlete is represented in an attitude similar to that of the _Idolino_ (Pl. 14). As there is an olive crown in the hair, it seems reasonable to conclude that the original statue was that of an Olympic victor.