09-23-2009, 08:04 PM
Because the Guttmann collection was full of heavily decorated helmets from Italy, these features will be covered in detail in the Guttmann publication.
First of all, these helmets are not hellenistic, at best early-hellenistic. I'm not aware of any greek helmets from Italy which should be dated younger than 4th century BC.
The mentioned features (Gorgoneion, wheels, horns) seem to appear exclusively on helmets from Italy, but this can also be preservation-conditioned: helmets from Italy were found mostly in tombs, helmets from Greece (except Macedonia) mostly in sanctuaries. Since the dedication of armour ended in mid-5th-century BC in the most important sanctuary, Olympia, almost no helmets from Greece from the 4th century are preserved. The many known helmets from 4th-century-BC-Italy can't be compared with contemporary examples from Greece.
First of all, these helmets are not hellenistic, at best early-hellenistic. I'm not aware of any greek helmets from Italy which should be dated younger than 4th century BC.
The mentioned features (Gorgoneion, wheels, horns) seem to appear exclusively on helmets from Italy, but this can also be preservation-conditioned: helmets from Italy were found mostly in tombs, helmets from Greece (except Macedonia) mostly in sanctuaries. Since the dedication of armour ended in mid-5th-century BC in the most important sanctuary, Olympia, almost no helmets from Greece from the 4th century are preserved. The many known helmets from 4th-century-BC-Italy can't be compared with contemporary examples from Greece.
Jörg
