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Museum of Classical Archaeology Databases

Grave Stele of Archestrate

According to an inscription on the cornice, which is missing from this cast, the dead woman’s name was Archestrate and was from Sounion. She is shown seated in an unusual slightly diagonal position. Holes in her earlobes show that the relief was decorated with metal jewellry; some traces of colour survive on the original too.

Another woman stands to the right, who has her hand raised to her cheek in a gesture of mourning. She also has an unusual hairstyle. In the background to the left a servant girl has been squeezed in, carved in shallow relief in contrast to the deeply-cut other two figures.

Not to be confused with another stele of the same name in Athens

Number: 
266
Material: 
Pentelic marble
Location of Original: 

Leiden, Rijksmuseum van Oudheden 1821:RO1A1

Size: 
1.67 x 1.37m
Accession: 

Purchased in 1884 from the casting establishment of Berlin Museum

References: 

Walston: Catalogue of Casts in the Museum of Classical Archaeology (1889), 61, no.274
Clairmont: Classical Attic Tombstones (1993), vol. III, 413

Date: 
Late C4 BCE
Inscription: 

Yes, but not on cast

Provenance: 

Found in 1819 in Aixone, half way between Athens and Sounion

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