Note 665 — Chapter II · GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF VICTOR STATUES AT OLYMPIA.

Long ago Turnebus (Advers., 1580, p. 486) explained the word in the sense of ἔγκρισις ἀθλητῶν, as used by Lucian, pro Imag., 11; cf., Cicero’s probatio, in his de Off., I, 144. Most modern commentators, however, refer the word to the statue, translating it “classical” or “chosen”: thus Urlichs, Chrest. Pl., 1857, p. 325; O. Jahn, Ueber die Kunsturteile des Plinius (Ber. saechs. Ges. d. Wiss., 1850), p. 125; H. L. von Urlichs, Blaetter f. d. bayr. Gymnasialsch., 1894, pp. 609 f., translates it “klassisch” or “mustergueltig,” i. e., serving as a pattern or standard. But the term was too well known as an athletic one for it ever to have been applied to a statue. The present participle, instead of the usual aorist (ἐγκριθείς), shows that Alkamenes’ statue represented an athlete in the act of undergoing selection. The old emendation into ἐγχριόμενος has been recently defended by Klein, Praxiteles, p. 50, who identifies Pliny’s statue with the Glyptothek Oil-pourer (Pl. 11); it is discredited by the occurrence of the epithet Encrinomenos as a Roman proper name, C. I. L., V, 1, 4429, which shows how familiar it was. See Jex-Blake, on the passage of Pliny.