Banqueting games : Kottabos and the female presence in Magna Graecia

Résumé 0

The game of kottabos, which took place once the symposium was under way, is without doubt the most famous of all banquet games. This ludic activity, the scene of emulation between the drinkers, consisted of projecting with a skillful and practiced gesture the last drop of wine from one’s cup toward a predefined target. Wine, the mediator of sociability, is in this context both the modality and the instrument of the game, while the banquet tableware is diverted from its primary use. Based on a selection of South Italian red-figure pottery, this article asks questions about the feminine agency associated with an entertainment usually considered as masculine. Simultaneously animated target, stake of the throw, player or playful accessory, the female presence as staged in the metaphorical field of the image is polyvalent and multiform. With the help of visual games, the painters were playing with codes and established norms by offering a renewed vision, real or fantasized, around the culture of wine.