Polyclitus

Polyclitus (active c.450–c.420 bc). One of the most celebrated of Greek sculptors. He was probably a native of Argos, although Pliny says he came from Sicyon. No original works by him survive, but several are known through Roman copies. He is now most famous for his Doryphorus (Spear Carrier), the best copy of which is in the Archaeological Museum in Naples. In this figure he is said to have embodied the system of mathematical proportions on which he wrote a book, and the statue—long regarded as a standard for ideal male beauty—is sometimes referred to as ‘The Canon’. Copies also exist of a Diadumenus (a youth wreathing a band round his head) by Polyclitus and of an Amazon with which, according to Pliny, he defeated Phidias in a competition. In antiquity his greatest work was held to be the colossal chryselephantine statue of Hera in her temple—the Heraeum—near Argos. It is now known only through descriptions and representations on coins, but ancient writers compared it favourably with Phidias' statue of Zeus at Olympia. Strabo said the Zeus was more magnificent but the Hera more beautiful in workmanship.