1. Origins-Tyche of Antioch

Eutychides, son and distinguished student of Lyssipos, was a bronze sculptor and painter. He lived during the Early Hellenistic period and came from Sikyon. His artistic activity is placed between the years 330 and 290 BC.¹ The most famous work of the artist is beyond doubt the Tyche of Antioch. It was a personification of the city of Antioch on the Orontes, the capital of the kingdom of the Seleucids in Syria, which was founded around 300 BC by Seleucos I Nikator, after the battle of Ipsos. Eutychides started his work right after the foundation of the city and completed it around 296-293 BC.² This bronze statue with its monumental dimensions became immediately famous for its artistic value and was repeatedly copied in a multiplicity of material. After the destructive earthquake of 115 BC the emperor Trajan restored it in its initial place.

2. Other works

According to ancient texts, Eutychides was specialized in personifications. Pliny³makes a special reference to a sculpture of river Eurotas, characteristically reporting that it gave the viewer the impression that it was “wetter than the water”. According to the same source,⁴ the artist painted also a chariot with two horses led by Nike (Victory). This was probably made for the city of Syracuse,⁵whereas thematical and stylistic reflections of the work can be traced in the artistic production of Italy.⁶

Pausanias mentions that Eutychides was also the creator of a bronze statue of the athlete Timosthenes in the stadium of Olympia.⁷ Amongst the students of the artist we should mention Kantharos from Sikyon, to whom also statues of athletes in Olympia are attributed.