IN the previous chapter, Egypt has been exhibited as the centre of
intelligence in the history of ancient art; and having explained the
connexion which can still be traced in the few remaining monuments of
the East, we now turn from the parent source to trace the progress of
refinement in the West, where, first in Greece, the human mind awoke
to the full consciousness of its capacious grasp, and of its exquisite
sensibilities.
The universal origin of sculptural representation, already noticed, in
the alliance which man forms with natural objects as shadowing forth
the affections or the regrets of the heart, is nowhere so conspicuous
as in Greece. Here art was poetry from the beginning; her consecrated
groves, her winding streams, her flowery plains, the azure depths of
her mountains, became at once the residence and the representatives
of those beings, whether divine or heroic, who constituted her
theology. By a people, simple in their habits, yet ardent in their
feelings, this early faith was long remembered,--such reminiscences
deeply tincturing much of what is most exquisitely descriptive and
sentimental in Grecian poetry. But a belief so abstract, so untangible
in its forms, and so remotely addressed to the senses, would soon prove
insufficient to maintain effectual empire over the passions. Attempts
were speedily made to secure, as it were, the more immediate presence
and protection of the objects of veneration or of worship. Men's
desires in this respect, however, as in all other instances, would
necessarily be limited by their knowledge and their powers. In the
primitive ages, accordingly, objects rude and unfashioned as we learn
from history, were adored as representing the divinities of Greece.
Even to the time of Pausanias, stones and trunks of trees, rough and
uninformed by art, were preserved in the temples: and though replaced
by forms almost divine, still regarded with peculiar veneration, as the
ancient images of the deities. As skill improved, these signs began
to assume more determinate similitude; and from a square column, the
first stage, by slow gradations something approaching to a resemblance
of the human figure was fashioned. These efforts at sculpture long
continued extremely imperfect. The extremities seem not to have been
even attempted; the arms were not separated from the body, nor the
limbs from each other, but, like the folds of the drapery, stiffly
indicated by deep lines drawn on the surface. Such appears to have been
the general state of the art immediately prior to the period when it
can first be traced, as cultivated with some degree of success in any
particular place. This occurs about twelve centuries before Christ.
The fine arts have never flourished in states not commercial; in this
respect, presenting a marked contrast to the origin and progress of
poetry and music; a fact singularly exemplified in the condition of
those cities where arose the primitive schools in Greece. Sicyon,
Ægina, Corinth, and Athens, were the first seats of commerce and of
sculpture. Sicyon, with its small but important territory, extending
a few miles along the south-eastern extremity of the Corinthian gulf,
was the most ancient of the Grecian states, and probably the oldest
city of Europe. From the earliest times, it became celebrated for the
wealth, enterprise, and intelligence of its population; and from the
Sicyonian academy were sent forth many of the most celebrated masters
of design; hence Sicyon obtained the venerable appellation of 'Mother
of the Arts.' The foundation of this school, though most probably of
much higher antiquity, is assigned to Dibutades, who, in the humble
occupation of a potter, became the accidental inventor of the art of
modelling. For this discovery, so precious in its subsequent effects,
he was indebted to the ingenuity of his daughter, who, inspired by
love, traced upon the wall, by means of a lamp, the shadowed profile of
the favored youth as he slept, that with this imperfect resemblance she
might beguile the lingering hours of absence. This outline the father,
filling up with clay, formed a medallion, which, even to the time of
Pliny, was preserved as a most interesting relic. To the same pleasing
origin painting has been ascribed--another instance of that delightful
charm, which, to their poetry, their arts, their philosophy even, the
Greeks have imparted by the constant union of sentiment and reason--of
the heart with the understanding.
The little island, or rather rock, of Ægina, still one of the most
interesting spots of Greece, rising above the waves of the Saronic
gulf, nearly opposite to Athens, affords a striking illustration of the
effects of commercial wisdom. Insignificant in extent, boasting of few
productions, it was yet enabled, by this wisdom, long and successfully
to maintain the struggle of warfare, and to cherish the arts of
peace and of elegance, especially sculpture, in a school, if not the
earliest, certainly latest distinguished by originality of style and
invention. Smilis was famous by his statues of Juno, especially one
at Samos, called by Pliny 'the most ancient image' of that goddess.
Even in the works of this, her first master, it is said, were to be
discovered a gravity and austere grandeur, the principles of that style
visible still in the noble marbles which once adorned, in Ægina, the
temple of Jupiter Panhellenius.
Corinth was early more celebrated as the patroness of painting.
Concerning Dædalus, the first of the Athenian sculptors, doubtful or
fabulous accounts have reached us; but a careful investigation of
circumstances proves, that of whatsoever country a native, he had
rendered himself renowned by the exercise of his skill at the court of
Minos before settling in Attica. The facts attending his arrival there,
and the history of his previous labours, enable us to fix dates, and to
trace the true source of improvement in Grecian art at this particular
era. Of the early establishments of the Greeks planted in the isles of
the Ægean, which even preceded the mother country in the acquisition
of wealth and intelligence, the Doric colony of Crete enjoyed, from
a very early period, the happiness and consequent power of settled
government. External advantages of situation first invited the access,
while domestic institutions secured the benefits, of ancient and
uninterrupted intercourse with Egypt. Hence the laws and the arts of
the Cretans. With the former, the Athenian hero, Theseus, wished to
transplant the latter also; and while he gave to his countrymen a
similar system of policy, he did not fail to secure the co-operation
of one whose knowledge might yield powerful aid in humanizing a rude
people by adding new dignity to the objects of national veneration.
Accordingly Dædalus, accompanying the conqueror of the Minotaur to
Athens, fixes there the commencement of an improved style, 1234 years
before the Christian era. With Dædalus, the artists already mentioned
are described as nearly or altogether contemporaries.
The performances of Dædalus were chiefly in wood, of which no fewer
than nine, of large dimensions, are described as existing in the second
century, which, notwithstanding the injuries of fourteen hundred
years, and the imperfections of early taste, seemed, in the words of
Pausanias, to possess something of divine expression. Their author, as
reported by Diodorus, improved upon ancient art, so as to give vivacity
to the attitude, and more animated expression to the countenance. Hence
we are not to understand, with some, that Dædalus introduced sculpture
into Greece, nor even into Attica; but simply that he was the first
to form something like a school of art, and whose works first excited
the admiration of his own rude age, while they were deemed worthy of
notice even in more enlightened times. Indeed the details preserved
in the classic writers, that he raised the arms in varied position
from the flanks, and opened the eyes, before narrow and blinking,
sufficiently prove the extent of preceding art, and the views we
have given on the subject. In these primitive schools, however, many
centuries necessarily elapsed, before sculpture can be considered as a
regular art. Their founders and pupils were little more than ingenious
mechanics, who followed carving among other avocations. Such were
Endæus of Athens, celebrated for three several statues of Minerva;
Æpeus, immortalized as the fabricator of the Trojan horse; Icmulous,
praised in the Odyssey as having sculptured the throne of Penelope;
with many others who must have contributed to the arts of the heroic
ages, and who, if they did not rapidly improve, at least kept alive the
knowledge of sculpture.
Besides these continental schools, another must be described, which
there is every reason to believe was still more ancient, and which
certainly attained higher perfection at an earlier period. This was
the insular Ionian school, flourishing in those delightful isles
that gem the coast of Asia Minor, and chiefly in Samos and Chios. To
this the continental academies were even indebted for many of their
most distinguished members, who, leaving the narrow sphere of their
island homes, naturally preferred the commercial cities from the same
causes which had rendered these originally seats of art, opulence,
intelligence, and security. Of the Samian masters, Rhæcus, about the
institution of the Olympiads, or 777 B. C., first obtained celebrity,
as a sculptor in brass, in which art, Telecles and Theodorus, his son
and grandson, also excelled. Their works in ivory, wood, and metal,
were extant in the age of Pausanius, whose description exhibits the
hard and dry manner of Egypt, whence it is probable these artists had
derived their improvements, distinguished for very careful finish.
The Chian school claims the praise of first introducing the use of a
material to which sculpture mainly owes its perfection, namely, marble.
The merit of this happy application is assigned to Malas, the father
of a race of sculptors, and who is placed about the 38th Olympiad, or
649 years before the Christian era. Michiades inherited and improved
the science of the inventor, transmitting to his own son, Anthermus,
the accumulated fame and experience of two generations of sculptors,
to whom, as to their successors, the beautiful marbles of their native
island furnished one rich means of superiority.
In the insular,--and the evidence is in favour of the Chian school,--we
also first hear of bronze statues. The earliest works of this kind were
not cast, but executed with the hammer. Two manners are discernible;
large figures were formed of plates, and hollow, the interior being
filled with clay; in small pieces, the separate parts were brought
nearly into shape in the solid, afterwards united, and the whole
finished by the graver and the file. These methods, in each of which
rivets, dovetails, and soldering, formed the joints, were gradually
superseded as the knowledge of casting was acquired.
About the commencement of the sixth century before Christ, the school
of Sicyon was illustrated by Dipænus and Scyllis, brothers, the
most famous of her ancient masters, and whose age forms an era in
the history of the ancient art, marking the first decided advances
towards the mastery of the succeeding style. Their labours were in
various materials, the most esteemed of marble; and the praise of its
application is shared betwixt them and the Chian school. Statues by
these artists, in Parian marble, were admired in the time of Pliny,
excited the cupidity of Nero, and are subsequently described by one
of the Christian fathers, from the peculiar veneration in which they
were held. The style of sculpture had hitherto been extremely dry and
minute;--a passion for extreme finish, in preference to general effect,
had distinguished former masters. This taste had been first introduced,
and afterwards maintained, by the limited resources of the art itself,
by the mediocrity of artists, and by the dress and ornaments of the
time. The hair arranged in undulating locks or spiral curls, and
sometimes little separate knobs, was laboured as if to be numbered;
the drapery, disposed in the most rigid and methodical folds, finished
with painful minuteness; at the same time the limbs and countenance
retained much of rude and incorrect form and tasteless expression, but
elaborated with the extreme of care. It is far easier, and the common
error, both of inferior genius and of an unskilful age, to bestow on
parts that talent and application by which a whole is to be perfected.
The fault of fastidious and useless labour, with inaccuracy of general
result, still attaches to the works of Dipænus and Scyllis, but great
melioration is also apparent; their execution was much more free, the
whole effect more powerful, the expression, if not more animated, more
natural, and the forms better selected and composed. Colossal heads,
now in the British Museum, of Hercules and Apollo, most probably of
these masters, afford an admirable illustration of these remarks, and
of the style of art at this early period. The fiftieth Olympiad, shows
all the necessary inventions and principles of mechanical art fully
known and universally practised. Even so early as the twentyninth
Olympiad, an equestrian group had been executed in Crete by Aristocles;
all the proper materials, and the methods of working them, had long
been discovered; in the greatest single work of these times, the shrine
of Apollo at Amyclæ, by Bathycles the Ionian, every description of
relief had been exhibited; and lastly, improvement had been fixed on
such principles of taste and composition, as enabled succeeding efforts
to carry it forward.
The extent of country in which the art was now cultivated, and the zeal
evinced in the pursuit, corresponded to, while they increased, the
improvement of taste. Attention is now directed to a new school, that
of Magna Græcia, which (during two thousand years), had been gradually
rising into importance and excellence. Its chief seats were at Rhegium
and Crotona in Italy, and in Sicily, Syracuse and Agrigentum. In these,
the artists first practised in metal chiefly, afterwards in marble;
and were among the foremost to perfect iconic statues,--a source of
most decided advantage to the art. Omitting farther enumeration,
one of these early masters, Dionysius of Rhegium, merits to be
mentioned as the first who composed a statue of Homer, erected about
the twenty-seventh Olympiad. This was an ideal bronze, in which the
traditionary resemblance had been preserved; and from this ancient
original were taken those portraits of the father of verse which are
mentioned by Pliny as so numerous in his time, and of which one or two
exquisite examples still remain.
Thus five centuries and a half before the Christian era, sculpture was
practised with success throughout the wide extent of Greece and her
colonies. During the former part of the sixth century, however, Sicyon,
whose school had added to its ancient supremacy by the superiority of
Dipænus and Scyllis, continued to send forth, in their pupils, the
most numerous and efficient artists. Of these, the principal were
Learchus, a native of Rhegium; Theocles, Dontas, Doryclidos, and Medon,
Lacedæmonians; Tecteus and Angelion of Delos, where they erected a
colossal statue of Apollo. At Rhegium, Clearchus was highly esteemed,
and had a very flourishing academy; while at Agrigentum, Perillus
rivalled the masters of the parent schools. He cast the famous bull
of Phalaris, afterwards carried off by the Carthaginians, restored by
Scipio, again the object of the cupidity of Verres, and of the praise
of Cicero, whose words, _ille nobilis Taurus_, prove that the skill of
those early ages has not been too highly appreciated.
But the fame of all preceding sculptors has suffered from the superior
reputation of the two Chian brothers, Bupalus and Anthemis, who lived
517 years B. C. They were the first who brought to a high degree of
perfection the discovery of their ancestors,--sculpture in marble.
Both Greece and Asia strove to possess their works, which were equally
numerous and excellent, and on which was inscribed, not their own,
but their father's name and their country's, in the following verse:
'The sons of Anthermus will render thee, O Chios, more renowned than
thy vines have yet done.' The beauty of these works caused them to be
highly valued in all succeeding ages, and they formed part of those
master-pieces removed to Rome by order of Augustus.
During the period of fiftyeight years, from the sixtieth to the
seventysecond Olympiad, and the battle of Marathon, sculpture
throughout Greece was vigorously exercised, and with corresponding
success. At Athens, which, though distinguished in the very
commencement of our narrative, has subsequently appeared in the
back ground, Pisistratus laid the foundation of that school whence
afterwards issued the new lights of the art. This extraordinary man
perceived and applied the proper remedy to the poverty of Attica: he
introduced manufactures and encouraged commerce; and while the true
sources of political greatness were thus opened, the more enviable
supremacy of his country was secured in the intellectual empire of
literature and the arts of elegance. Yet this man has been termed, in
the history of that very country, a tyrant, because he saved her from
her worst enemy, the mob--miscalled free citizens--slaves of their own
passions, and agents in the hands of demagogues. Our own times are not
without similar prejudices. Mankind seem destined, in all ages, to be
the dupes of fears and of phantoms which they themselves have evoked,
and which distract attention from real danger. Happy that state,
governed by rulers, who, like Pisistratus, will respect the essentials
of free institutions, who will consecrate the resources of the state
to promote the national grandeur, and save the people from themselves!
Under his protection were assembled the most esteemed artists of all
descriptions: of sculptors, Eucharis was famous for the figures of
warriors in armour; and Callon for statues of bronze. Callimachus
is praised as master of all the arts of design, and in sculptural
composition had introduced a lightness and elegance before unattained.
In other parts of Greece, during the same interval, were the following:
Dameas, of whose works, the statue of his compatriot Milo was the most
celebrated, and which the latter, among his other wonderful feats,
carried to the place of erection. Polycletus, the first of the name,
and his master Ageladas, finished at Argos, their native city, the
statue of Cleosthenes in a car, soon after the sixtyseventh Olympiad,
and one of the greatest works yet undertaken. At Sicyon were the
brothers Canachus and Aristocles, whose two Muses were the finest
statues then known; and of which, one is supposed to be the famous
antique now in the Barbarini palace. Ascarus, at Elis, produced a
Jupiter crowned with flowers; Menecmus and Soidas a Diana, afterwards
placed in the palace of Augustus. Menecmus was the first who wrote on
the principles of his art. The Dioscorides of Egesias, contemporary
with the Persian invasion, have, by a misinterpretation of Pliny, been
assigned to the figures now on Monte Cavallo, at Rome.
The victory of Marathon, B. C. 490, inspired fresh vigour into the
genius and institutions of Greece. From this date, to the government
of Pericles, intervenes a period in moral grandeur, the brightest,
perhaps, in Grecian history. Of the sculptors who then flourished,
the immediate predecessors, or early contemporaries, of Phidias, the
following were the chief: Onatas and Glaucias, of Egina; the one
modelled an admirable statue of Gelon, king of Syracuse; the other, an
iconic figure of Theagines of Thasos, four hundred times victorious
in the public games. Critias replaced the statues of Harmodias and
Aristogiton, the originals having been carried off by Xerxes. Calamis
was still more renowned for his horses, which were likewise iconic
statues--a proof how early nature was admitted as the only guide in
every department of sculpture. Pythagoras of Rhegium surpassed all
his predecessors; his statues of Enthymus and Astylas, conquerors in
the Olympic games, were masterpieces of form; and in expression, his
Philoctetes exhibited deeper and truer sentiment than had yet appeared
in any work. The name of Pythagoras, indeed, is closely associated with
the general advancement of the art, as ranking among the inventors of
that system of proportion which, derived from nature, taught to unite
elegance with truth, and which invariably guided the practice, while
its perfection was improved by the discoveries, of each succeeding
master. In the mechanical department, also, his manner was more bold,
firm, and graceful, in delicacy of style being placed by Quintilian
inferior only to Myron, the last and the greatest of the early school.
Myron, a native of Eleutheræ, exercised his profession chiefly at
Athens, of which he enjoyed the citizenship. The decline of his life
corresponds with the early labours of Phidias: Myron thus unites
the first and second ages of Grecian sculpture, combining in his
works many of the essential excellences of its perfection, with
some of the remaining hardness and defects of its pupillage. In
adopting this chronology, we seem to reconcile conflicting opinions
both with each other and with history. The principal works of Myron
were in bronze, and the most colossal in wood; consequently, no
original of his hand has come down to modern times. There can,
however, be no doubt that the famous Discobolos is preserved to us
in more than one antique repetition. Hence, and from the writings
of the orators and historians, a fair estimate of his merits may
be deduced. His composition was distinguished for energy, science,
and truth. Iconic statues he carried to a degree of excellence and
vigour, as in the portrait of Ladus, unsurpassed in any succeeding
age. The Bacchus, Erectheus, and Apollo, executed by order of the
state, were not less admired by the Athenians; the last, carried
away by Antony, was restored to them by Augustus, in consequence of
a dream. His representations of animals were equally admirable; and
seem, if possible, to have been more universally praised, judging
from the circumstance of no fewer than thirtysix laudatory poems on
the famous heifer being still extant in the Anthology. Myron carried
mere imitative art to its utmost limits; yet in some of the minor
details, the dry manner of the first ages appeared. Sculpture, as
the representation of the external form, he perfected; but as an
instrument of touching the heart--of elevating the imagination--of
embodying sentiment, he proved unequal to call forth its powers. He
represented nature forcibly and with fidelity, but without grandeur or
ideal elevation. An important approach, however, to just conceptions
of abstract beauty, is to be perceived in the principle which he is
said first to have promulgated,--that propriety in the separate parts
was beauty, or that a work of art was beautiful as a whole, according
as the partial forms and proportions corresponded to their offices and
to the general character. This, in fact, is the essence of corporeal
beauty, the highest refinement of material art; and assigns to form,
independent of mind, the noblest expression of which it is susceptible.
This is the utmost range attained by the genius of this the first
period in the history of art in Greece, and an admirable ground-work
for the sublimity, and refined perceptions of the beautiful, added in
the era that followed.
Casting a retrospect over the ages that have passed in review, how are
we struck with the slow and painful growth of human invention! The
collective energies and discoveries of a thousand years were required
to rear the arts of Greece--not to their perfection, but to the state
where the first decided approaches to it commence. Such is the length
of time from the first feeble glimmerings of imitative art to the era
of Dipænus and Scyllis, Bupalus and Anthermus. The interval of forty
years occupied by these artists, from the fiftieth to the sixtieth
Olympiad, may be considered as terminating the old, and introducing
the new school. The art was now in possession of all the means and
instruments, the correct application of which bound the aspirings and
the praise of mediocrity, but which merely become subservient to the
aims of loftier minds. During part of this period, also, these means
were industriously, and with daily improving skill, employed. From
this date to the battle of Marathon, an interval of fifty-eight years,
improvement was rapid in every corner of Greece and her colonies.
Fortunately, also, the movement then given to Sculpture was one of
diffuse activity, not an influence derived from, and sustained amongst,
a few leading minds, whose authority might thus have operated fatally,
by binding down to fixed and imperfect modes the aspirings of future
genius. This advantage was secured by the number of independent states
forming the Grecian confederacy, a constitution, which, throughout the
whole history of ancient art, exercised the most beneficial effects,
both by preventing mannerism, in taste, and by nourishing emulation.
The Persian invasion, the victories of Marathon, Salamis, and Platea,
awakened a new energy in the moral character of Greece, infusing at
the same time into her institutions a vigour and a stability before
unknown. From the elevation she had now attained among the nations of
the earth, her genius rushed forward as from vantage ground. In every
field of mental enterprise, indeed, a certain preparation had already
been made, and in some the best exertions had long been achieved. In
poetry a sublimity had been attained, which has yet set at nought all
succeeding rivalry. But in that knowledge, and in those arts, which
depend less upon individual eminence, and more upon the circumstances
of the times, and upon a strong national interest,--in all those
studies which embrace numbers by their consequences or their success,
which demand the union of patient perseverance with high talent, and
finally, which pertain to the business of public life, and require deep
insight into the nicer distinctions of human character--all, from this
happy era, with an almost supernatural progress, attained maturity.
The opulence and security, with the resulting consciousness of power,
and the love of elegance, which followed the defeat of the Barbarians,
proved especially propitious to the arts of sculpture and architecture.
If in the former any doubt be entertained, what the difference of
improvement was between the artists who preceded and those who
followed the age of Xerxes, we have only to recall the fortunes of
the drama during the same heart-stirring period. In the last of the
74th Olympiad, A. C. 489, or one year after the battle of Marathon,
Æschylus placed the first wreath upon the solemn brow of Tragedy.
Not twenty years afterwards, the warrior bard was vanquished by his
youthful rival. Between the Prometheus of Æschylus, then, and the
[OE]dipus of Sophocles, we find as wide an interval as is necessary to
suppose between the sculptures contemporary with the former, and the
productions of Polycletus or Myron.