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<p>[QUOTE="Terence Cheesman, post: 3471280, member: 86498"]Fundamental to any understanding of what constitutes a portrait is an understanding of how the gods were depicted in ancient art. Normally these images were standardized e.g Zeus as a mature laureate bearded male, Apollo as a young clean shaven male and Athena as a helmeted female. To further cement the identification process a subsidiary object or animal are incorporated into the design or placed on the reverse. Thus Zeus could be distinguished from Poseidon as he would be seen with his trademark trident. Thus these images would be instantly recognizable to their audience. </p><p> I believe this to be important especially for early portraits as all the early portraits seem to have some form of adjunct object. Alexander has the horn of Ammon as well as in Egypt an elephant head headdress. Demetrios Poliorcetes has a diadem and bull horns and Ptolemy I a diadem as well as an aegis. These adjuncts would serve the purpose of distinguishing this image from that of a god e.g Ptolemy I a male using an aegis usually associated with the goddess Athena. Thus some issue may have .." the features of".. are probably not portraits in the classic sense as the lack of some form of identifying adjunct would make the image ambiguous.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="Terence Cheesman, post: 3471280, member: 86498"]Fundamental to any understanding of what constitutes a portrait is an understanding of how the gods were depicted in ancient art. Normally these images were standardized e.g Zeus as a mature laureate bearded male, Apollo as a young clean shaven male and Athena as a helmeted female. To further cement the identification process a subsidiary object or animal are incorporated into the design or placed on the reverse. Thus Zeus could be distinguished from Poseidon as he would be seen with his trademark trident. Thus these images would be instantly recognizable to their audience. I believe this to be important especially for early portraits as all the early portraits seem to have some form of adjunct object. Alexander has the horn of Ammon as well as in Egypt an elephant head headdress. Demetrios Poliorcetes has a diadem and bull horns and Ptolemy I a diadem as well as an aegis. These adjuncts would serve the purpose of distinguishing this image from that of a god e.g Ptolemy I a male using an aegis usually associated with the goddess Athena. Thus some issue may have .." the features of".. are probably not portraits in the classic sense as the lack of some form of identifying adjunct would make the image ambiguous.[/QUOTE]
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