IphigeniaAulis1.0110

Josiah Wedgwood, "The Sacrifice of Iphigenia", ceramic plaque (Jasperware with green dip and white applied reliefs), ca. 1795, on a design by Camillo Pacetti; London, Victoria & Albert Museum, inv. no. 4938-1901.

The plaque was produced in numerous copies from ca. 1788. Its subject matter is variously argued. It is identified by the Victoria & Albert Museum (see V&A site) as "Menelaus and Diomed[es] discovering Achilles among the daughters of Lycomedes [on Scyros]." The Getty site concurs, identifying the subject in a 1871 print called "Wedgwood's Sacrifice of Iphigenia" as "a plaque depicting Achilles among the daughters of Lycomedes in relief." (Chaffers 1871 print. Carol Macht (see right side-bar) sees the figure as "Achilles in Scyros" and that reading the relief as an Iphigenia sacrifice is a "misnomer." It is agreed that the design is by Pacetti, that artwork was supervised by John Flaxman, Jr., and that the piece was executed in Staffordshire, England at the Wedgwood factory. Pacetti may have used a 3rd-century sarcophagus in Rome's Capitoline Museum, inv. MC0218.