THE HELLENISTIC PERIOD OF GREEK SCULPTURE. 323-146 B.C.
The reign of Alexander began a new era in Greek history, an era in
which the great fact was the dissemination of Greek culture over
wide regions to which it had been alien. This period, in which
Egypt and western Asia were ruled by men of Greek or Macedonian
blood and gradually took on more or less of Greek civilization, is
often called the Hellenistic period.
Under the new political and social order new artistic conditions
were developed. For one thing, Athens and the other old centers of
artistic activity lost their pre-eminence, while new centers were
created in the East, The only places which our literary sources
mention as seats of important schools of sculpture in the two
centuries following the death of Alexander are Rhodes and
Pergamum.
Then again a demand now grew up for works of sculpture to be used
as mere ornaments in the interiors of palaces and private houses,
as well as in public buildings and places. This of course threw
open the door for subjects which had been excluded when sculpture
was dominated by a sacred purpose. Sculptors were now free to
appeal to the lower tastes of their patrons. The practice of "art
for art's sake" had its day, and trivial, comical, ugly,
harrowing, or sensual themes were treated with all the resources
of technical skill. In short, the position and purposes of the art
of sculpture became very like what they are to-day. Hence the
untrained modern student feels much more at home in a collection
of Hellenistic sculpture than in the presence of the severer,
sublimer creations of the age of Phidias.
It is by no means meant to pass a sweeping condemnation upon the
productions of the post-classical period. Realistic portraiture
was now practiced with great frequency and high success. Many of
the genre statues and decorative reliefs of the time are admirable
and delightful. Moreover, the old uses of sculpture were not
abandoned, and though the tendency toward sensationalism was
strong, a dignified and exalted work was sometimes achieved. But,
broadly speaking, we must admit the loss of that "noble simplicity
and quiet grandeur"--the phrase is Winckelmann's--which stamped
the creations of the age of Phidias. Greek sculpture gained
immensely in variety, but at the expense of its elevation of
spirit.
Although this sketch is devoted principally to bronze and marble
sculpture, I cannot resist the temptation to illustrate by a few
examples the charming little terra-cotta figurines which have been
found in such great numbers in graves at Tanagra and elsewhere in
Boeotia (Figs. 169, 170). It is a question whether the best of
them were not produced before the end of the period covered by the
last chapter. At all events, they are post-Praxitelean. The
commonest subjects are standing or seated women; young men, lads,
and children are also often met with. Fig. 170 shows another
favorite figure, the winged Eros, represented as a chubby boy of
four or five--a conception of the god of Love which makes its
first appearance in the Hellenistic period. The men who modeled
these statuettes were doubtless regarded in their own day as very
humble craftsmen, but the best of them had caught the secret of
graceful poses and draperies, and the execution of their work is
as delicate as its conception is refined.
Returning now to our proper subject, we may begin with the latest
and most magnificent of the sarcophagi found at Sidon (Fig. 171;
cf. page 234). This belongs somewhere near the end of the fourth
century. It is decorated with relief-sculpture on all four sides
and in the gables of the cover. On the long side shown in our
illustration the subject is a battle between Greeks and Persians,
perhaps the battle of Issus, fought in 333. Alexander the Great,
recognizable by the skin of a lion's head which he wears like
Heracles, instead of a helmet, is to be seen at the extreme left.
The design, which looks crowded and confused when reduced to a
small scale, is in reality well arranged and extremely spirited,
besides being exquisitely wrought. But the crowning interest of
the work lies in the unparalleled freshness with which it has kept
its color. Garments, saddle-cloths, pieces of armor, and so on,
are tinted in delicate colors, and the finest details, such as
bow-strings, are perfectly distinct. The nude flesh, though not
covered with opaque paint, has received some application which
differentiates it from the glittering white background, and gives
it a sort of ivory hue. The effect of all this color is thoroughly
refined, and the work is a revelation of the beauty of
polychromatic sculpture.
The Victory of Samothrace (Fig. 172) can also be dated at about
the end of the fourth century. The figure is considerably above
life-size. It was found in 1863, broken into a multitude of
fragments, which have been carefully united. There are no modern
pieces, except in the wings. The statue stood on a pedestal
having the form of a ship's prow, the principal parts of which
were found by an Austrian expedition to Samothrace in 1875. These
fragments were subsequently conveyed to the Louvre, and the
Victory now stands on her original pedestal. For determining the
date and the proper restoration of this work we have the fortunate
help of numismatics. Certain silver coins of Demetrius
Poliorcetes, who reigned 306-286 B.C., bear upon one side a
Victory which agrees closely with her of Samothrace, even to the
great prow-pedestal. The type is supposed on good grounds to
commemorate an important naval victory won by Demetrius over
Ptolemy in 306. In view, then, of the close resemblance between
coin-type and statue, it seems reasonably certain that the Victory
was dedicated at Samothrace by Demetrius soon after the naval
battle with Ptolemy and that the commemorative coins borrowed
their design directly from the statue. Thus we get a date for the
statue, and, what is more, clear evidence as to how it should be
restored. The goddess held a trumpet to her lips with her right
hand and in her left carried a support such as was used for the
erection of a trophy. The ship upon which she has just alighted is
conceived as under way, and the fresh breeze blows her garments
backward in tumultuous folds. Compared with the Victory of
Paeonius (Figs. 143, 144) this figure seems more impetuous and
imposing. That leaves us calm; this elates us with the sense of
onward motion against the salt sea air. Yet there is nothing
unduly sensational about this work. It exhibits a magnificent
idea, magnificently rendered.
From this point on no attempt will be made to preserve a
chronological order, but the principal classes of sculpture
belonging to the Hellenistic period will be illustrated, each by
two or three examples. Religious sculpture may be put first. Here
the chief place belongs to the Aphrodite of Melos, called the
Venus of Milo (Fig. 173). This statue was found by accident in
1820 on the island of Melos (Milo) near the site of the ancient
city. According to the best evidence available, it was lying in
the neighborhood of its original pedestal, in a niche of some
building. Near it were found a piece of an upper left arm and a
left hand holding an apple; of these two fragments the former
certainly and perhaps the latter belong to the statue. The prize
was bought by M. de Riviere, French ambassador at Constantinople,
and presented by him to the French king, Louis XVIII. The same
vessel which conveyed it to France brought some other marble
fragments from Melos, including a piece of an inscribed statue-
base with an artist's inscription, in characters of the second
century B.C. or later. A drawing exists of this fragment, but the
object itself has disappeared, and in spite of much acute
argumentation it remains uncertain whether it did or did not form
a part of the basis of the Aphrodite.
Still greater uncertainty prevails as to the proper restoration of
the statue, and no one of the many suggestions that have been made
is free from difficulties. It seems probable, as has recently been
set forth with great force and clearness by Professor Furtwangler,
[Footnote: "Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture," pages 384 ff.] that
the figure is an adaptation from an Aphrodite of the fourth
century, who rests her left foot upon a helmet and, holding a
shield on her left thigh, looks at her own reflection. On this
view the difficulty of explaining the attitude of the Aphrodite of
Melos arises from the fact that the motive was created for an
entirely different purpose and is not altogether appropriate to
the present one, whatever precisely that may be.
It has seemed necessary, in the case of a statue of so much
importance, to touch upon these learned perplexities; but let them
not greatly trouble the reader or turn him aside from enjoying the
superb qualities of the work. One of the Aphrodites of Scopas or
Praxiteles, if we had it in the original, would perhaps reveal to
us a still diviner beauty. As it is, this is the worthiest
existing embodiment of the goddess of Love. The ideal is chaste
and noble, echoing the sentiment of the fourth century at its
best; and the execution is worthy of a work which is in some sense
a Greek original.
The Apollo of the Belvedere (Fig. 174), on the other hand, is only
a copy of a bronze original. The principal restorations are the
left hand and the right fore-arm and hand. The most natural
explanation of the god's attitude is that he held a bow in his
left hand and has just let fly an arrow against some foe. His
figure is slender, according to the fashion which prevailed from
the middle of the fourth century onward, and he moves over the
ground with marvelous lightness. His appearance has an effect of
almost dandified elegance, and critics to-day cannot feel the
reverent raptures which this statue used to evoke. Yet still the
Apollo of the Belvedere remains a radiant apparition. An attempt
has recently been made to promote the figure, or rather its
original, to the middle of the fourth century.
As a specimen of the portrait-sculpture of the Hellenistic period
I have selected the seated statue of Posidippus (Fig. 175), an
Athenian dramatist of the so-called New Comedy, who flourished in
the early part of the third century. The preservation of the
statue is extraordinary; there is nothing modern about it except
the thumb of the left hand. It produces strongly the impression of
being an original work and also of being a speaking likeness. It
may have been modeled in the actual presence of the subject, but
in that case the name on the front of the plinth was doubtless
inscribed later, when the figure was removed from its pedestal and
taken to Rome. Posidippus is clean-shaven, according to the
fashion that came in about the time of Alexander. There is a
companion statue of equal merit, which commonly goes by the name
of Menander. The two men are strongly contrasted with one another
by the sculptor in features, expression, and bodily carriage. Both
statues show, as do many others of the period, how mistaken it
would be to form our idea of the actual appearance of the Greeks
from the purely ideal creations of Greek sculpture.
Besides real portraits, imaginary portraits of great excellence
were produced in the Hellenistic period. Fig. 176 is a good
specimen of these. Only the head is antique, and there are some
restorations, including the nose. This is one of a considerable
number of heads which reproduce an ideal portrait of Homer,
conceived as a blind old man. The marks of age and blindness are
rendered with great fidelity. There is a variant type of this head
which is much more suggestive of poetical inspiration.
Portraiture, of course, did not confine itself to men of
refinement and intellect. As an extreme example of what was
possible in the opposite direction nothing could be better than
the original bronze statue shown in Fig. 177. It was found in Rome
in 1885, and is essentially complete, except for the missing
eyeballs; the seat is new. The statue represents a naked boxer of
herculean frame, his hands armed with the aestus or boxing-gloves
made of leather. The man is evidently a professional "bruiser" of
the lowest type. He is just resting after an encounter, and no
detail is spared to bring out the nature of his occupation.
Swollen ears were the conventional mark of the boxer at all
periods, but here the effect is still further enhanced by
scratches and drops of blood. Moreover, the nose and cheeks bear
evidence of having been badly "punished," and the moustache is
clotted with blood. From top to toe the statue exhibits the
highest grade of technical skill. One would like very much to know
what was the original purpose of the work. It may have been a
votive statue, dedicated by a victorious boxer at Olympia or
elsewhere. A bronze head of similar brutality found at Olympia
bears witness that the refined statues of athletes produced in
the best period of Greek art and set up in that precinct were
forced at a later day to accept such low companionship. Or it may
be that this boxer is not an actual person at all, and that the
statue belongs to the domain of genre. In either case it testifies
to the coarse taste of the age.
By genre sculpture is meant sculpture which deals with incidents
or situations illustrative of every-day life. The conditions of
the great age, although they permitted a genre-like treatment in
votive sculptures and in grave-reliefs (cf. Fig. 134), offered few
or no occasions for works of pure genre, whose sole purpose is to
gratify the spectator. In the Hellenistic period, however, such
works became plentiful. Fig. 178 gives a good specimen. A boy of
four or five is struggling in play with a goose and is triumphant.
The composition of the group is admirable, and the zest of the
sport is delightfully brought out. Observe too that the
characteristic forms of infancy--the large head, short legs, plump
body and limbs--are truthfully rendered (cf. page 222). There is a
large number of representations in ancient sculpture of boys with
geese or other aquatic birds; among them are at least three other
copies of this, same group. The original is thought to have been
of bronze.
Fig. 179 is genre again, and is as repulsive as the last example
is charming. It is a drunken old woman, lean and wrinkled, seated
on the ground and clasping her wine-jar between her knees, in a
state of maudlin ecstasy. The head is modern, but another copy of
the statue has the original head, which is of the same character
as this. Ignobility of subject could go no further than in this
work.
It is a pleasure to turn to Fig. 180, which in purity of spirit is
worthy of the best time. The arms are modern, and their direction
may not be quite correct, though it must be nearly so. This
original bronze figure represents a boy in an attitude of prayer.
It is impossible to decide whether the statue was votive or is
simply a genre piece.
Hellenistic art struck out a new path in a class of reliefs of
which Figs. 181 and 182 are examples. There are some restorations.
A gulf separates these works from the friezes of the Parthenon and
the Mausoleum. Whereas relief-sculpture in the classical period
abjured backgrounds and picturesque accessories, we find here a
highly pictorial treatment. The subjects moreover are, in the
instances chosen, of a character to which Greek sculpture before
Alexander's time hardly offers a parallel (yet cf. Fig. 87). In
Fig. 181 we see a ewe giving suck to her lamb. Above, at the
right, is a hut or stall, from whose open door a dog is just
coming out; at the left is an oak tree. In Fig. 182 a lioness
crouches with her two cubs. Above is a sycamore tree, and to the
right of it a group of objects which tell of the rustic worship of
Bacchus. Each of the two reliefs decorated a fountain or something
of the sort. In the one the overturned milk-jar served as a water-
spout; in the other the open mouth of one of the cubs answered the
same purpose. Generally speaking, the pictorial reliefs seem to
have been used for the interior decoration of private and public
buildings. By their subjects many of them bear witness to that
love of country life and that feeling for the charms of landscape
which are the most attractive traits of the Hellenistic period.
The kingdom of Pergamum in western Asia Minor was one of the
smaller states formed out of Alexander's dominions. The city of
Pergamum became a center of Greek learning second only to
Alexandria in importance. Moreover, under Attalus I. (241-197
B.C.) and Eumenes II. (197-159 B.C.) it developed an independent
and powerful school of sculpture, of whose productions we
fortunately possess numerous examples. The most famous of these is
the Dying Gaul or Galatian (Fig. 183), once erroneously called the
Dying Gladiator. Hordes of Gauls had invaded Asia Minor as early
as 278 B.C., and, making their headquarters in the interior, in
the district afterwards known from them as Galatia, had become the
terror and the scourge of the whole region. Attalus I. early in
his reign gained an important victory over these fierce tribes,
and this victory was commemorated by extensive groups of sculpture
both at Pergamum and at Athens. The figure of the Dying Gaul
belongs to this series. The statue was in the possession of
Cardinal Ludovisi as early as 1633, along with a group closely
allied in style, representing a Gaul and his wife, but nothing is
certainly known as to the time and place of its discovery. The
restorations are said to be: the tip of the nose, the left knee-
pan, the toes, and the part of the plinth on which the right arm
rests,[Footnote: Helbig, "Guide to the Public Collections of
Classical Antiquities in Rome," Vol I, No 533.] together with the
objects on it. That the man represented is not a Greek is evident
from the large hands and feet, the coarse skin, the un-Greek
character of the head (Fig. 184). That he is a Gaul is proved by
several points of agreement with what is known from literary
sources of the Gallic peculiarities--the moustache worn with
shaven cheeks and chin, the stiff, pomaded hair growing low in the
neck, the twisted collar or torque. He has been mortally wounded
in battle--the wound is on the right side--and sinks with drooping
head upon his shield and broken battle-horn. His death-struggle,
though clearly marked, is not made violent or repulsive. With
savage heroism he "consents to death, and conquers
agony."[Footnote: Byron, "Childe Harold," IV, 150] Here, then, a
powerful realism is united to a tragic idea, and amid all
vicissitudes of taste this work has never ceased to command a
profound admiration.
Our knowledge of Pergamene art has recently received a great
extension, in consequence of excavations carried on in 1878-86
upon the acropolis of Pergamum in the interest of the Royal Museum
of Berlin. Here were found the remains of numerous buildings,
including an immense altar, or rather altar-platform, which was
perhaps the structure referred to in Revelation II. 13, as
"Satan's throne." This platform, a work of great architectural
magnificence, was built under Eumenes II. Its exterior was
decorated with a sculptured frieze, 7 1/2 feet in height and
something like 400 feet in total length. The fragments of this
great frieze which were found in the course of the German
excavations have been pieced together with infinite patience and
ingenuity and amount to by far the greater part of the whole. The
subject is the gigantomachy, i.e., the battle between the gods and
the rebellious sons of earth (cf. page 134).
Fig. 185 shows the most important group of the whole composition.
Here Zeus recognizable by the thunderbolt in his outstretched
right hand and the aegis upon his left arm, is pitted against
three antagonists. Two of the three are already disabled. The one
at the left, a youthful giant of human form, has sunk to earth,
pierced through the left thigh with a huge, flaming thunderbolt.
The second, also youthful and human, has fallen upon his knees in
front of Zeus and presses his left hand convulsively to a wound
(?) in his right shoulder. The third still fights desperately.
This is a bearded giant, with animal ears and with legs that pass
into long snaky bodies. Around his left arm is wrapped the skin of
some animal; with his right hand (now missing) he is about to hurl
some missile; the left snake, whose head may be seen just above
the giant's left shoulder, is contending, but in vain, with an
eagle, the bird of Zeus.
Fig. 186 adjoins Fig 185 on the right of the latter. [Footnote:
Fig 186 is more reduced in scale, so that the slabs incorrectly
appear to be of unequal height.] Here we have a group in which
Athena is the central figure. The goddess, grasping her antagonist
by the hair, sweeps to right. The youthful giant has great wings,
but is otherwise purely human in form. A serpent, attendant of
Athena, strikes its fangs into the giant's right breast. In front
of Athena, the Earth-goddess, mother of the giants, half emerging
from the ground, pleads for mercy. Above, Victory wings her way to
the scene to place a crown upon Athena's head.
If we compare the Pergamene altar-frieze with scenes of combat
from the best period of Greek art, say with the metopes of the
Parthenon or the best preserved frieze of the Mausoleum, we see
how much more complicated and confused in composition and how much
more violent in spirit is this later work. Yet, though we miss the
"noble simplicity" of the great age, we cannot fail to be
impressed with the Titanic energy which surges through this
stupendous composition. The "decline" of Greek art, if we are to
use that term, cannot be taken to imply the exhaustion of artistic
vitality.
The existence of a flourishing school of sculpture at Rhodes
during the Hellenistic period is attested by our literary sources,
as well as by artists' inscriptions found on the spot. Of the
actual productions of that school we possess only the group of
Laocoon and his sons (Fig. 187). This was found in Rome in 1506,
on the site of the palace of Titus. The principal modern parts
are: the right arm of Laocoon with the adjacent parts of the
snake, the right arm of the younger son with the coil of the snake
around it, and the right hand and wrist of the older son. These
restorations are bad. The right arm of Laocoon should be bent so
as to bring the hand behind the head, and the right hand of the
younger son should fall limply backward.
Laocoon was a Trojan priest who, having committed grievous sin,
was visited with a fearful punishment. On a certain occasion when
he was engaged with his two sons in performing sacrifice, they
were attacked by a pair of huge serpents, miraculously sent, and
died a miserable death. The sculptors--for the group, according to
Pliny, was the joint work of three Rhodian artists--have put
before us the moving spectacle of this doom. Laocoon, his body
convulsed and his face distorted by the torture of poison, his
mouth open for a groan or a cry, has sunk upon the altar and
struggles in the agony of death. The younger son is already past
resistance; his left hand lies feebly on the head of the snake
that bites him and the last breath escapes his lips. The older
son, not yet bitten, but probably not destined to escape, strives
to free himself from the coil about his ankle and at the same time
looks with sympathetic horror upon his father's sufferings.
No work of sculpture of ancient or modern times has given rise to
such an extensive literature as the Laocoon. None has been more
lauded and more blamed. Hawthorne "felt the Laocoon very
powerfully, though very quietly; an immortal agony, with a strange
calmness diffused through it, so that it resembles the vast rage
of the sea, calm on account of its immensity." [Footnote: "Italian
Note-books," under date of March 10,1858.] Ruskin, on the other
hand, thinks "that no group has exercised so pernicious an
influence on art as this; a subject ill chosen, meanly conceived,
and unnaturally treated, recommended to imitation by subtleties of
execution and accumulation of technical knowledge," [Footnote:
"Modern Painters," Part II, Section II, Chap. III.] Of the two verdicts
the latter is surely much nearer the truth. The calmness which
Hawthorne thought he saw in the Laocoon is not there; there is
only a terrible torment. Battle, wounds, and death were staple
themes of Greek sculpture from first to last; but nowhere else is
the representation of physical suffering, pure and simple, so
forced upon us, so made the "be-all and end-all" of a Greek work.
As for the date of the group, opinion still varies considerably.
The probabilities seem to point to a date not far removed from
that of the Pergamene altar; i.e., to the first half of the second
century B.C.
Macedonia and Greece became a Roman province in 146 B.C.; the
kingdom of Pergamum in 133 B.C. These political changes, it is
true, made no immediate difference to the cause of art. Greek
sculpture went on, presently transferring its chief seat to Rome,
as the most favorable place of patronage. What is called Roman
sculpture is, for the most part, simply Greek sculpture under
Roman rule. But in the Roman period we find no great, creative
epoch of art history; moreover, the tendencies of the times have
already received considerable illustration. At this point,
therefore, we may break off this sketch.