Dionysos, found in the Heraion at Olympia (_Figs._ 227 and 228), has
proved the error of imputing to all the works of Praxiteles a delicate
gracefulness verging upon weakness, which had arisen from the study of
the only examples hitherto known--the copies of the Sauroctonos, the
Satyr, and the Aphrodite. The manly force of this statue, in character
midway between the conceptions of Pheidias and Lysippos, is, indeed, so
surprising that some scholars have even been inclined to assume a second
sculptor by the name of Praxiteles, there being no reason to doubt the
direct testimony of Pausanias as to the authorship of this work. The
beauty of this torso exceeds that of all other antique statues known;
the expression of the head conveys that intense sympathy between the
loving protector and the child which must have characterized the work of
Kephisodotos referred to above. It is possible that the Hermes was the
product of an earlier period of the sculptor’s development, more closely
related to the tendency and ideals of Pheidian art. When it is
considered that this torso is the only surely authenticated original
production of any great master of Greek sculpture--for it is by no means
certain that the gable groups of the Parthenon are by the hand of
Pheidias himself--there is no need for further discussion of the
fundamental importance of this most fortunate discovery.
[Illustration: Fig. 227.--Hermes with the Infant Dionysos. (From the
Heraion at Olympia.)]
Notwithstanding the astonishing many-sided genius and productivity of
Praxiteles, nearly all the Olympian deities appearing in the half
hundred of his works, it must still be acknowledged that, besides his
pathetic tendency, he particularly affected that province in which the
figures of maidens or youths gave opportunity for the development of the
greatest charms. His works portray a sensual loveliness distinguished
alike from that hard and abstract beauty, that outward perfection of
form sought and attained by Polycleitos, and from that elevated, godlike
being ideally embodied by Pheidias in his Zeus and his Athene. Neither
entirely human, as with Polycleitos, nor divine, as with Pheidias, this
emotional loveliness seemed created for the world of gods, but little
raised above the sight and experience of men; and this type appears to
have been as well established by Praxiteles as that of the higher
deities by Pheidias. Its examples are the Aphrodite and Eros, the
youthful Dionysos with his train, the Demeter, and the Eleusinian
circle.
[Illustration: Fig. 228.--Head of the Hermes of Praxiteles.]
[Illustration: Fig. 229.--Venus of Melos. (Louvre.)]
However important the school of these two masters of pathos may have
been, but few among the numerous names that have been preserved became
prominent. The chief exceptions are the above-mentioned assistants of
Scopas upon the mausoleum, and the two sons of Praxiteles, Kephisodotos
the younger, and Timarchos. Two of the greatest works of statuary,
however, may be ascribed to their most vigorous scholars--the Venus of
Melos in the Louvre (_Fig._ 229) and the so-called Ilioneus in the
Glyptothek at Munich. If the doubtful inscription of the artist upon the
former be credited, which, in characters of the first century B.C.,
designated it as the production of |Ale|xandros, son of Menides of
Antioch upon the Meander, but which, together with the corresponding
part of the plinth, has disappeared, we should possess in this work an
inexplicable anachronism, a creation of the highest rank in art produced
during a period of decided decadence. As, however, through this loss,
this assumption cannot be verified, science must proceed to judge it by
its style alone. Its grandeur and dignity, in contrast to the immodest
coquetry of later works; the fulness of the flesh in this body of
ever-blooming youth, in comparison with their attenuated grace; the mild
softness of the surface beside the cold polish of the other figures of
Aphrodite--would place this statue between the period of highest
perfection at the time of Praxiteles, and that of the Roman
reproductions. The reference of the Venus of Melos to the school of
Praxiteles has found a justification not to be undervalued in the
discovery of the Hermes at Olympia, this figure of manly youth forming
as complete a pendant to the maidenly Venus as could be imagined. In
artistic character this is far more nearly related to the Hermes than
is any other statue of Aphrodite, not excepting the undoubted Roman
reproduction of that of Cnidos. At any rate, it is clearly an Hellenic
original, not belonging to the period of later Hellenistic art.
Unfortunately, no explanation of this statue hitherto advanced has been
entirely satisfactory. The two arms are wanting, and the fallen drapery
covering the lower limbs has hidden from us the only accessory
evidence--namely, the object upon which the lifted left leg is
supported; so that even the name of Venus is not to be applied with the
usual certainty. The Roman types of Victory, also half nude, with the
same garments and position, and with the shield upon which the conquest
is inscribed, suggest an Aphrodite-Victory analogous to the Attic
Athene-Victory. The restorations all present points of difficulty; among
them may be mentioned that commonly received, where the goddess
contemplates herself in the shield of Ares, supported by the analogy of
a statue mentioned by Pausanias (ii. 5), an interpretation equally
applicable to the Venus of Capua, now in Naples; that also of Wiesler,
with the lance in the uplifted left hand; and the combination of the
goddess in a group with Ares by Quatremère de Quincy.
It is even less easy to find a reliable explanation of the beautiful
torso in the Glyptothek at Munich, formerly held, falsely, to be
Ilioneus among the Niobids, and even believed to be an original. As the
Venus of Melos is an illustration of ripened womanly beauty, the
entirely nude, cowering figure, without head or arms, represents the
perfection of youth; and the position suggests a subject equal in
pathetic import to that of the children of Niobe.
As the works of Scopas and Praxiteles frequently found their way to the
islands of the Ægean Sea, and as the former, at least, had certainly
dwelt for some time in Asia Minor, the influence of these two masters
appears to have extended eastward, and their style to have had decided
sway even longer there than in Greece proper. The farthest outlying
examples are presented by the fragmentary statues of the Nereids from
the Monument of Xanthos, to which they have given the name.
At that period, even in Athens, some highly esteemed artists not only
partially followed their own ways, but in these surpassed the former
masters, and pursued aims which did not become generally prevalent until
the middle of the fourth century, and then in quite other localities.
These were Silanion of Athens and Euphranor of the Isthmos. The first
devoted himself chiefly to portraits and representations of victors, and
was so especially successful in the former as to make them a real
embodiment of personal character; as, for instance, the portrait of the
passionate sculptor Apollodoros was made to appear a personification of
sudden rage. Silanion distinguished himself from Praxiteles in the
subjects of his art, in which he had much in common with Lysippos.
Euphranor was also, perhaps in a still greater degree, a painter, and,
in the coarser power of his creations, was opposed to the delicate style
of Praxiteles, showing more affinity with Lysippos, so far, at least, as
we can judge of his sculptures by the accounts of his paintings.
Similar to the transitional position between Pheidias and Scopas, held
by the elder Kephisodotos, was the position taken by these two sculptors
between the art of Scopas and Praxiteles and that of Lysippos, for whom
the studies and innovations in the canons of human proportions prepared
the way. Though self-taught, for as a youth he had been a hand-worker in
brass, and from this had raised himself to the position of an artist, he
was still not without connection with the schools, since he took as his
model the Doryphoros of Polycleitos, the academic pattern mentioned
above, and also worked in bronze, the material most favored by
Polycleitos and the artists of the Peloponnesos. He cannot, however, be
called a direct scholar of Polycleitos, whose canon he corrected and
even replaced by a new one, better adapted to the artistic aims of the
younger masters. The model of Polycleitos was the human body, but
Lysippos felt that he must set his ideal of humanity higher than in the
average of real examples, because he considered these, in comparison
with the perfect figure, to be degenerate and dwarfed. Although he
worked with reference to this view, still he developed his types from
the real appearances of nature; and when asked by the painter Eupompos
of Sikyon for advice as to the best teacher, he pointed to an assemblage
of people. He wished to represent man, however, not as he is, but as he
should be, and employed only those features which did not fall below
the average determined by Polycleitos. His ideal type of the human body
became more slender and larger, the size being especially apparent
because the head and extremities, which take their proportions from the
whole, were made smaller.
[Illustration: Fig. 230.--Marble Copy of the Apoxyomenos of Lysippos.
(In the Vatican.)]
Lysippos, however, followed the footsteps of Polycleitos in considering
the establishment of a canon as the greatest essential in art, and
exercised his powers chiefly in the province of humanity. His
Apoxyomenos--the athlete scraping himself with the strigil, a marble
copy of which is in the Vatican--is the most celebrated among his
statues of athletes and victors. (_Fig._ 230.) In this he seems to have
set forth his new confession of faith, in opposition to that of
Polycleitos. This aim must have had the most important influence upon
portrait-sculpture, the chief field of his activity. It is clear from
the accounts of some likenesses of persons long dead, or even legendary,
that he fully expressed the character in the features, as in the
Apollodoros of Silanion, and did not aim at that over-scrupulous
reproduction of details and attention to circumstantial matters which
endeavor to attain a likeness by sharp observation of external things,
unessential to the whole. This inferior style of portraiture was
pursued by Lysistratos, the brother of Lysippos, who formed his figures
after plaster casts from nature. Although earlier portraits might have
informed the sculptor in regard to the true features of some historical
personages, certainly this could not have been the case with Æsop, or
the Seven Wise Men, for whose individuality and intellectual tendencies
he was obliged to create a characteristic type. In the portrait which he
most frequently executed, that of Alexander the Great, it was of
especial importance to illuminate the ugly and faulty formation of the
monarch’s face by the expression of his powerful character, and to
execute it so appropriately that even the likeness was increased by such
depth of appreciation. The artist thus produced portraits of the
conqueror which differed as much, and as favorably, from the realistic
and chance appearance of the king as the historic illustration of a
great personage does from the knowledge of that individual in every-day
life. Alexander, accordingly, would be represented in sculpture by no
one except Lysippos, as he would be painted by none but Apelles. Even
that best-preserved portrait of Alexander, the bust in the Capitol, does
not suffice to make clear the whole conception of Lysippos. How grand
such monumental portraitures really were may be gathered from the
account of the group at Dium--afterwards transferred to the Portico of
Octavia in Rome--illustrating a scene from the battle upon the Granicos,
where twenty-five warriors on horseback and nine on foot were grouped
about the king, to which many of the enemy may doubtless be added.
The work next in importance after this was the representation of
Heracles by this master. Not in the elevation of the ideal above the
human, but rather in the emphasizing of this latter quality, did the
Heracles of Lysippos stand in distinct opposition alike to the merely
human model of Polycleitos, to the superhuman and godlike beings of
Pheidias, and especially to the divinely charming beauty of the
Aphrodite and the Eros, as seen in the best creations of Scopas and
Praxiteles. The Heracles of Lysippos, the embodiment of strength
developed beyond human possibility, appeared colossal, whether the
absolute dimensions were really great--like the statue from Tarention
which represented him resting upon a basket after the labor of cleansing
the Augean stables--or whether in miniature, suitable for a table
ornament--like the celebrated Epitrapezios, showing the hero as a
drinker. Copies, in part, still remain of the Labors of Heracles,
executed in twelve groups for Alyzia, in Acarnania. They show the same
type that is reproduced in the affected, overstrained statue of the
later Athenian artist Glycon--the so-called Farnese Hercules in Naples.
(_Fig._ 231.)
[Illustration: Fig. 231.--Farnese Hercules of Glycon. (In the Museum of
Naples.)]
Besides these prominent groups by Lysippos, evidences of his creative
energy, the figures of the deities appear to have been few in number.
That examples from the circle of young and beautiful divinities, which
formed the principal field for the art of Praxiteles, should be almost
entirely wanting, was to be expected, he who had perfected the type of
Heracles naturally preferring a powerful figure. Four statues of Zeus
are mentioned. Though the colossal size of these seems to have been a
prominent feature--the Zeus of Tarention measuring eighteen metres in
height--still they should not be considered as executed after a
conventional pattern, and consequently offering nothing worthy of
remark. In view of all that is known of Lysippos, it seems not
improbable that the Zeus of Otricoli (_Fig._ 232), formerly referred to
the Pheidian type, may be more nearly related to its modification by
Lysippos. The Helios upon the quadriga in Rhodes, besides its human
beauty, may possibly have been of great importance in type and
conception; but this is not assured by the fact that Nero prized it
highly, and ordered it to be gilded. If it be added that Lysippos worked
more industriously and rapidly than any other known sculptor--provided
the account be true that the number of his productions amounted to
fifteen hundred--it cannot be supposed that the time required for new
conception and careful execution would be given to them all.
[Illustration: Fig. 232.--Zeus of Otricoli. (Vatican.)]
The school of Lysippos was not wanting in names of renown. His most
gifted son, Euthycrates, appears to have equalled his father in groups
of portrait statues, like the Gathering of Riders and a Hunt of
Alexander in Thespia; while another son, Boidas, awakens our interest
from the circumstance that the celebrated Praying Boy, in the museum at
Berlin, may possibly be referred to him. Chares of Lindos produced the
greatest known work of Greek sculpture in regard to size--namely, the
colossal statue of the sun at Rhodes, over thirty metres high. Pliny
describes it as already fallen and in ruins, therefore his words give us
no information as to the conception and style; and the current account
of its having stood so high above the entrance to the harbor that
vessels sailed between the legs is a fabulous reminiscence of the figure
projected at Mount Athos by Deinocrates. Among the scholars of Lysippos,
Eutychides seems to have been the most independent; the goddess
Anticheia, a copy of which is in the Vatican, was distinguished by
excellence in the motive, ease of position, and effective drapery; but,
in its genre-like treatment, it excluded all thought of religious art,
to which a certain strictness and dignity should pertain. This goddess
was seated with dignity, like a city itself, while another
personification--the river-god--appeared “more flowing than water.” This
marked significance in both cannot be ascribed to a happy chance, but
must be regarded as evidence of that highly developed characterization
by which the great Sikyonian master endeavored to conceive the whole
being and to embody it in his portraits and representative figures.
Among the nameless works from the school of Lysippos, creations are to
be found of the highest merit. The originator of the Barberini Faun, now
in the Glyptothek at Munich, whoever he may have been, should be ranked
among the greatest masters of all times.
[Illustration: Fig. 233.--Boreas.]
[Illustration: Fig. 234.--Notos. From the Tower of the Winds, Athens.]
With Lysippos the development of art in its principal directions was
terminated. As Overbeck says, “the summit lies behind us; we descend,
and our way downwards may still lead through charming landscapes; but
the pure, clear ether soon ceases to surround us, and, before the
far-reaching glance, rises from the mist of centuries the flat and
endless desert, in the sands of which the stream of Grecian art is
quenched.” Alexander himself was the patron of the last of the seven
great masters of sculpture; with him ended the fresh directness of
Hellenic creations, as well as the greatness of Greece itself. He and
his successors built temples afterwards to be furnished, as before, with
statues of the deities and outwardly ornamented with sculptures; but
they took their models from those earlier works which, elevated to a
typical and canonical importance, were not to be surpassed, and employed
themselves simply in reproducing. They followed more willingly the easy
path open to them because, in the Alexandrian period, scepticism, empty
formalism, and chilling indifference had already laid the ravaging axe
to the Hellenic religion. With the spread of Hellenic power into the
heart of Asia, its art, like its polity, lost its individuality,
becoming _expansive_ instead of _intense_, in decorative subjection to
the requirements of elegance and use. Losing its former independent
nobility, sculpture soon fell from the height which it had occupied for
a century and a half. Athens, Sikyon, and Argos, hitherto central points
of development, where art had brought forth its richest fruits as a
model for the entire Hellenic world, now became provincial cities of
the Macedonian kingdom, and lost their glory--some for a long period,
and others forever. Following the example of Lysippos, artists preferred
wandering from court to court of Alexander’s successors; and in
Alexandria, Antioch, Seleucia, in Nicomedia, Pergamon, Ambrakia, mostly
new and elegant cities of royal residence, occupation could not have
been wanting, though the quantity of work may have tended to hasten the
decline. How extensive and extravagant were the artistic requirements of
the Diadochi, how excessive the incense of flattery offered them, is
shown in the description of the luxurious works of the Ptolemies and of
the Seleucidæ, and by the three hundred statues erected to Demetrius
Phalereus in Athens alone. These last may have been somewhat better than
the representation of the winds upon the clepsydra and vane of
Andronicos Kyrrhestios (_Figs._ 233 and 234), but even they must be
classed as mere artisan-work. Much was done in portrait-statuary after
the time of Alexander, who turned art in this direction; and the
successive dynasties also encouraged it, as may easily be imagined. This
is evident from the statues still preserved, from the Ptolemaic cameos,
and especially the coins of the Diadochi. The heads of these kings have
never been equalled, for fine and lifelike characterization and
modelling, in all the portrait coins and medallions which have been
struck down to the present time. (_Fig._ 235.)
Though a great deal was produced in the period of the Diadochi, and, in
the line of portraiture, much that was good, still there must have been
truth in the saying of Pliny that “after the 121st Olympiad (290 B.C.)
art ceased, and revived again only in the 156th (150 B.C.).” It ceased,
namely, in so far as it was made subservient to courts and decoration;
but upon the soil of Greece itself, and among the people, it grew, and
strove after higher aims. The production continued, but its artisan-like
elaboration did not make good the lost artistic originality. Men of
vigorous talent followed in the paths of Praxiteles and Lysippos,
producing works which are the ornaments of our antique collections; but
the character of reproductions, clinging to their creations, robs them
of the name of artist in the full sense of the word. The scanty notices
of Pliny are, in general, correct; but he omits to mention some
exceptions which represent a further development of sculpture, not quite
unimportant, though questionable in principle.
[Illustration: Antiochos I. of Syria. 281 to 262.
Philip V. of Macedon. 220 to 178.
Perseus of Macedon. 178 to 168.
Fig. 235.--Coins of the Diadochi.]
[Illustration: Fig. 236.--The So-called Dying Gladiator. School of
Pergamon.]
In two places, at the royal court of Pergamon and in the republic of
Rhodes, productive art rose again to a certain independence and
originality. Pliny himself, in another place, says that “several artists
illustrated the battles of Attalos and Eumenes against the Gauls;
namely, Isigonos, Phycomachos, Stratonicos, and Antigonos.” The great
victory over these barbarians was fought in 229 B.C. by Attalos, with
which Eumenes, by a misunderstanding easily to be explained, appears to
have been connected. Attalos erected in his capital a grand monument to
his victory, and, not contenting himself with this, consecrated another
upon the Acropolis at Athens, perhaps in part a copy of that in
Pergamon. Remnants of both monuments still exist which give a
comparatively good knowledge of the artistic peculiarities of this
school. The investigations upon this site, now approaching completion,
have unearthed hundreds of fragments in high-relief, part of a
gigantomachia originally forming the decoration of an altar. The altar
was surrounded by Ionic colonnades, the high stereobate of which was
ornamented with sculptures in high-relief, the whole being elevated upon
a gigantic terrace, 38 m. long, and 34 m. broad. The frieze,
representing the gigantomachia, stands midway between the works of
Lysippos and the Laocoon, and forms the most extensive and important
monument of sculpture remaining from the time of the Diadochi; it is in
many respects a parallel to that of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassos which
represents the decorative work of the school of Scopas and Praxiteles.
These works have now found their way to Berlin, but a critical account
of them will be possible only when they shall have been made generally
accessible by an official publication. The statue of the so-called Dying
Gladiator of the Capitol belonged to the group in Pergamon already known
(_Fig._ 236); as did the two figures in the Villa Ludovisi, representing
a Gaul who, to escape the shame of slavery, has stabbed his wife, who
sinks beside him, and is about to thrust the sword into his own neck.
In the so-called Dying Gladiator, the rough hair growing low upon the
neck, the strongly marked indentation between the brow and the
projecting Northern nose, the beard shorn to the upper lip, the heavy
cheek-bones, the fleshy and somewhat clumsily formed body, the hard and
calloused skin upon the hands and feet, the twisted neckband, and the
curved battle-horn have long since shown the meaning of this statue. In
the group in the Ludovisi Villa, the same marble, a like and peculiar
treatment of the forms, with the same type of head, leave no doubt that
this also belonged to a large group representing a victory over the
Gauls. From its style, it cannot be considered as a Roman monument,
particularly as some notices of the Athenian Votive Offering of Attalos
clearly identify it.