Grave Marker

CultureGreek

Dateearly 4th century B.C.E.

MediumMarble

DimensionsOverall: 35 1/4 inches (89.54 cm)

Credit LinePurchase: William Rockhill Nelson Trust

Object number31-86

On View

On view

Gallery Location

Collections

Ancient Art

Terms

DescriptionFour figures in low relief, two shaking hands in parting.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

Pandora’s Box: Women in Classical Greece, Walters Art Gallery, Baltimore, MD, November 5, 1995-January 7, 1996; The Dallas Museum of Art, TX, February 4, 1996-March 31, 1996; Antikenmuseum Basel und Sammlung Ludwig, Basel, Switzerland, April 28, 1996-June 23, 1996, no. 21.

Gallery Label

On this grave marker, a young man and woman—presumably a married couple—shake hands while two older men—probably their fathers—stand behind them. The couple has been separated by death. While it is unclear which spouse has died, their handshake and closely mirroring positions suggest a love transcending death. This grave marker, which is missing its upper part, was shaped like the clay vessels that were sometimes buried with the deceased as gifts

Provenance

Purchased, through Harold Woodbury Parsons, by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1931.

Published References

The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Handbook of the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1933), 119.

Christopher Clairmont, Classical Attic Tombstones, vol. 4 (Kilchberg, Switzerland: Akanthus, 1993), 29, no. 4.150 (with plate).

Roger Ward and Patricia J. Fidler, eds., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the

Collection (New York: Hudson Hills Press, in association with Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 1993), 117.

Ellen Reeder, Pandora: Women in Classical Greece, exh. cat. (Baltimore: Walters Art Gallery, 1995), 160-61, no. 21.

Deborah Emont Scott, ed., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collection, 7th ed. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2008), 12, fig. 31.

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