Also known as the Altar of Kleomenes. This cylindrical altar is decorated with deep reliefs. The goddess Artemis forced Agamemnon, the leader of the Greeks in their wars against Troy, to sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia. In a different version of the myth Artemis changed her mind and saved Iphigenia, and she became a priestess in the service of the goddess’s cult.
Iphigenia is depicted at the sacrificial altar, while Calchas, a fortune teller the Greeks took with them on their Trojan expedition, is about to cut a lock of her hair
Florence, Uffizi 79
Hauser: Die Neu Attischen Reliefs (1889), 78, no.109
Amelung: Führer durch die Antike in Florenz (1896), 55, no.79
Dütschke: Antike Bildwerke in Florenz (1875), 97, no.165
Walston: Catalogue of Casts in the Museum of Classical Archaeology (1889), 74, no.353
From the Giardino di Castello, of the Medicis
