page_title: Sounion Kouros
section_title: Idealization
hierarchical_section_title: Sounion Kouros / Form / Idealization
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Museum Delphi, Sphinx
context_page_description: The Sounion Kouros is an early archaic Greek statue of a naked young man or kouros carved in marble from the island of Naxos around 600 BCE. It is one of the earliest examples that scholars have of the kouros-type which functioned as votive offerings to gods or demi-gods, and were dedicated to heroes. Found near the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion, this kouros was found badly damaged and heavily weathered. It was restored to its original height of 3.05 meters returning it to its larger than life size. It is now held by the National Archaeological Museum of Athens.
  Ancient Greeks were influenced by their Egyptian neighbors when creating kouroi. The Egyptian influence is especially evident in the pose of the figure. Archaic sculptors intended to idealize the human form which is made evident by the modeling of the Sounion Kouros. Sculptors of kouri attempted to convey slight movement and more naturalism over the course of the 6th century BCE.
context_section_description: In Ancient Greece, idealized figures were simultaneously considered beautiful and to represent strong morality and a virtuous nature. Idealized sculptures were pleasing to both the eyes of humans and the gods so they were used as offerings. As it was found near the Temple of Poseidon, it is probable that the Sounion Kouros was considered a beautiful votive offering for the pleasure of the god. The Sounion Kouros is idealized as it was the intent of the artist "to convey an ideal of the human form – one that subscribes to a number of stylised and formal patterns than its real-life, physical or natural appearance." Sculpted in the beginning of the 6th century BC, the Sounion Kouros is representative of Archaic sculptors' shift to render naturalistic figures: "That interest in pattern and symmetry is characteristic of Archaic sculpture, although it gives way to the apparent attempt to imitate the natural form of the human body during the course of the sixth century BCE."
  Greek men wore nudity as a costume when they were aspiring to be associated with the ideal, elite, aristocratic, or heroic. The kouros-type were offerings to gods and dedicated to heroes so kouroi wore the costume of nudity to symbolize the heroic sentiment, a concept referred to as Heroic nudity. The Sounion Kouros was an offering to Poseidon so it probably displays heroic nudity as well.
caption: The statue-pair of Kleobis and Biton, ca. 570 BCE
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