March 31: Kalkan to Fethiye
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![]() The so-called "Harpy Tomb" - ca. 5th century BC. Sitting upon a massive base is a thick pillar with a grave-chamber and crowning slabs, standing about 7.5 metres high. The chamber at the top was marble and decorated with splendid marble reliefs. It was previously believed that the winged women figures in the freize were harpies (monsters from Greek mythology with the head of a woman and the body of a bird). It is now thought that these figures may depict sirens carrying off the souls of the dead. In these reliefs we see the use of isocephaly, that is, the convention often used in Greek relief sculpture whereby the heads of the figures are placed at nearly the same level, regardless of whether the figure is standing, seated or in another position. This convention provides harmony by avoiding unpleasing blank spaces and can give greater dignity to a seated figure because of its larger size. The original reliefs were taken by Charles Fellows and are now in the British Museum but have been replaced by some nice casts. |