UNGLAZED POTTERY.--THE GREEK VASE.
Palaces of Homer's Heroes.--The Ceramicus at Athens.--Egyptian
Pottery.--Etruscan Tombs.--Good and Bad Vases.--Age of
Vases.--Various Styles.--The Archaic Style.--The Fine
Style.--Beauty a Birthright.--Aspasia's House.--Names of
Vases.--The Cup of Arcesilaus.--Number of Extant Vases.--Their
Uses.--The Greek Houses.--Greek Women.--Greek Men.--The
Hetairai.--Etruscan Vases.
The GREEK VASE has come to be a synonym for beauty of form. Not that
every Greek vase is perfect--by no means--but that the Greeks had come
to feel and were able to express perfection of form in it as it had not
been done before, and as it has not been better done since.
[Illustration: FIG. 27.--_Egyptian Kylix._]
So much interest hangs around this expression of the potter's art, that
we give more space to the subject than to many other branches of the
art. Keeping this perfection in mind, the manner of life of those
Greeks, out of which the Greek vase grew, becomes of value, and is
indeed of most interest.
How did the Greeks live, and why was the Greek vase made?
That the finest houses or palaces of the chiefs of the Heroic or Homeric
period were larger, and more marked by barbaric splendor, than were the
dwellings of the great in the days of Pericles, is admitted.
We give from Mr. Bryant's translation of the Iliad a brief description
of Hector's return to Troy from the battle-field:
"And now had Hector reached the Scean gates
And beechen tree. Around him flocked the wives
And daughters of the Trojans eagerly;
Tidings of sons and brothers they required,
And friends and husbands. He admonished all
Duly to importune the gods in prayer,
For woe he said was near to many a one."
He passed onward in search of Andromache:
"And then he came to Priam's noble hall,
A palace built with graceful porticoes,
And fifty chambers near each other walled
With polished stone, the rooms of Priam's sons,
And of their wives; and opposite to these
Twelve chambers for his daughters, also near
Each other; and with polished marble walls,
The sleeping-rooms of Priam's sons-in-law
And their unblemished consorts. There he met
His gentle mother on her way to seek
Her fairest child Laodice."
That the description is glorified, we need not doubt, for that is the
province of poetry; and poor is the poet who does not see the beauty
through the squalor, the sunshine through the cloud.
The Greek house of the time of Pericles was much smaller and less
splendid than this.
It is a curious fact to know that most of what remains to us of the
_living_ Greeks and Egyptians has been saved for us by the dead. Not a
complete house of the living exists; while those of the dead have been
unearthed not only in Greece, but in parts of Italy, which in many
places was colonized by Greeks, and in which Greek customs and Greek
art had a strong hold.
[Illustration: FIG. 28.--_Egyptian Bottle, Side and Front View._]
The Egyptians honored their dead, the Greeks honored their dead, and the
Romans honored their dead. Let them have our thanks; for, because of
that, things of interest and beauty are left to us.
In their tombs have been found gold-work, jewels, manuscripts, vases:
all of which tell their stories of the way men lived, how they worked,
what they sought; all of which show us that man then was the same as man
is now--if you pricked him he bled, if you tickled him he laughed. We
are apt to think that the Past was ignorant, brutal, savage. Have we,
boastful as we are, made porcelain better than the Chinese? Have we made
vases more beautiful than the Greeks? Poetry more musical?
In the far past man was savage, brutal, ignorant; and there is in man
still the latent tiger. In the civilization of which we boast, there
exist in all great cities, side by side with luxury and splendor,
poverty, wretchedness, squalor, brutality.
In the days of Pericles, in those days when the Amphora and the Temple
reached their most perfect development, the influences of Art and Poetry
were most potent upon that small democratic oligarchy which possessed
Athens and tyrannized over Greece. Then the tiger lay down in the midst
of a wonderful wealth of architecture, sculpture, poetry, eloquence,
painting (we suppose), and pottery. Then a whole district of the city to
the northwest of the Acropolis and the Areopagus was occupied by the
shops of the potter and the painter, and was known as the CERAMICUS, or
_Keramicus_, as it now is often spelled. From that centre went out into
all the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea thousands upon thousands of
those vases and pots which were made and decorated there, and from whose
pictures we have drawn much of our knowledge of Greek life, art,
manners, and dress.
[Illustration: FIG. 29.--_Egyptian Vase._]
In this high time of ART lay the seeds of corruption and death. The
Athenian Greek became critical, refined, weak, luxurious, corrupt,
base; and then he went to decay. In some tombs (Fig. 30) opened in
Italy, the body is found lying at length in the middle, and about it
stand perfect vases, love-offerings of friends: were they once filled
with perfumes upon which the spirit of the dead was wafted away? We
place flowers in the graves of our lovely ones, and, beautiful as they
are, they vanish with the dead. But the Greek vase remains to us after
the lapse of two thousand years.
[Illustration: FIG. 30.--_Tomb found in the Environs of Naples._]
When the Greeks--how early--began to fashion their fine work is not
surely known; but pottery of theirs exists dating as far back as 700 B.
C. Behind them were the Assyrians and the Egyptians, both nations great
in war and great in the arts of peace. The remains we have of both show
the Egyptians to have been the masters, with whom began those arts which
grew and bore fruit in Assyria and in Greece. But the art of the
Egyptians seems never to have reached the lightness, the delicacy, the
exquisite beauty of line, which yet glorify the fictile art of Greece.
Older than the oldest writings of the Hebrews, older than Homer, is the
potter's wheel; through all history it has been the friend and companion
of man; its products are part of his daily life; and delicate, brittle
as they are, they have proved more enduring than the Pyramids.
[Illustration: FIG. 31.--_The Archaic Period._]
Nearly all the pieces of pottery found in Egypt belong to those things
which went into the daily uses of life. Most of them are of common clay,
with common forms, and rude finish; and they seem to have been of all
shapes and designed for many purposes. Great casks, vases, pots for oil,
for grain, for meats, for wines, for drugs, for lamps; children's
marbles, checkers, toys, rings, amulets, bottles, etc., etc., are among
the many things shaped by the potter in Egypt.
Of those things made for ornamental purposes, there still exist some
vases which approach the simple beauty of the Greek; of which we give
one as pictured by Wilkinson in his work upon the antiquities of Egypt.
Fig. 27 is an _Egyptian kylix_ or _drinking-cup_. It much resembles the
Greek kylix or cylix, except that the foot is less perfect.
[Illustration: FIG. 32.--_The Departure of Achilles, from Vase in the
Louvre._]
The highly-ornamented bottle (Fig. 28, _aryballos_) is another thing
made purely for purposes of luxury, which Potiphar's wife used to hold
her dainty perfumes--perfumes which, we may easily believe, would add to
her dangerous charms. It is modeled from the African calabash, which was
the first vessel used there for carrying water. Form and decoration are
both perfect in this small bottle.
[Illustration: FIG. 33.--_Kylix, of an Early Form._]
We add a figure of very ancient Egyptian pottery, an early example of
the efforts of that people at the human figure in clay. It is made to
serve the purposes of a vase, whether for religious uses or other we do
not know (Fig. 29).
[Illustration: FIG. 34.--_Kylix, Finer Form._]
The terra-cotta earthenware vases and cups of the Greek and Etruscan
potters, by universal consent, have come to be accepted as the most
beautiful and satisfactory. That they were thus perfect from the start,
and always so, no one need maintain; but that from Greece and from many
parts of it should have come such a vast number of vessels, nearly all
of which are beyond criticism, is what no one can fully explain.
Whence came the inspiration, the perception of beauty, which made the
ordinary potter an artist, no man can tell.
It is not possible that the men who worked at the potter's wheel in
Athens, or in Samos, or in Crete, were "educated," as we say it, to such
a fine sense of the beautiful. We, with all the education we can put
into our people, do not equal them. We can no more explain this than we
can tell how such a wonderful growth of beautiful cathedrals shot up
into life in France in what we call the "Middle Ages." Nor was this
perfection only to be found among the potters who worked in Greece. It
brought forth works fit for gods in Cyrenaica, on the northern coast of
Africa, in great abundance; of which farther on we give an example in
the _Cup of Arcesilaus_. The wandering potters who went into Italy, and
there produced those beautiful vases, were Greeks. We have been in the
habit of calling them "Etruscan vases," because they have been found in
largest numbers and in most perfect preservation in Etruria. But it is
now well known that the real Etruscan potters never reached the same
technical skill, or had any such eye for form, as was common among the
Greeks.
[Illustration: FIG. 35.--_Greek Rhyton, in the Louvre._]
I have mentioned the tombs--that many of the finest Greek vases have
been found in those of Italy, and particularly in the part once called
Etruria. In Fig. 30 is shown one of these tombs discovered near Naples.
In it may be seen the remains of the body, with vases of various shapes
standing or hanging on the wall. Most of the vases found with the dead
in Greece were buried in the soil, and are thus less perfect than those
found in Italy.
[Illustration: FIG. 36.--_Greek Amphora, Panathenaic._]
GOOD AND BAD.--While, then, we can exalt the Greek vase to a foremost
place in the perfection of form, let us say that there are very many
Greek vases and pots which are _bad_, _common_, _vulgar_. So that no
buyer, no student, must admire with his eyes shut. Hardly any
considerable collection is without these bad things. Therefore, whoever
seizes upon a Greek vase with the belief that it is beautiful because it
is Greek, may wake some day to dash his god to pieces as false.
[Illustration: FIG. 37.--_Amphora, from the Louvre._]
Let us guard, too, against another chance for disappointment. Nearly all
the best vases extant have lain for centuries underground; they have
lost the freshness and fineness of their polish; their coloring is often
defaced; they are, perhaps, scratched or chipped. Seeing these rather
dilapidated examples of the fictile art with eyes of extravagant
expectation, one may feel disappointment or disgust. But let him look on
till he sees and feels the subtile springing lines which shot from the
brain of the potter, and inspired his hand to shape the vase.
[Illustration: FIG. 38.--_Amphora._]
As to the age of the Greek vases there are some evidences. The Greek
poet Pindar, who lived between 520 and 440 B. C., describes the amphoræ,
those painted vases which were given as prizes at the Panathenaic
festivals (see Fig. 36), and they are spoken of by Aristophanes, Strabo,
and others.[3]
Many attempts have been made to classify the works of the Greek potters,
and the result is of some value, though a considerable degree of
vagueness must attach to such as cannot be fixed by any signature or by
the subject. Demmin,[4] Brongniart,[5] Birch, and others, have attempted
classifications. We give here a sketch of that of the last as, on the
whole, the most simple and probable; the writer follows Gerhard:
1. The "Ancient" or "Archaic" style, from B. C. 700 to 450.
2. The "Fine Style" from B. C. 450 to 328. The best were during the time
of Phidias.
3. The Decadence, from B. C. 228 to the end of the Social Wars, B. C.
87. This includes all made in Italy down to the time of Augustus, at
which period most of the towns and works in "Magna Græcia" and the south
of Italy had been destroyed.
To the first or Archaic period are attributed the vases with yellow
ground, having brown and maroon figures, mostly hatchings, flowers, or
rude representations of animals, such as the goat, the pig, the stork,
etc., etc. Whenever the human figure appears on the vases of this period
it is shorter and less graceful than that on later work.
The next period is likely to show the figures in yellow upon black
ground; the designs here are more beautiful; the subjects are
mythological, historical, and poetical, and the human figures often have
the grace and beauty which mark the best period of Grecian art.
The Decadence is marked by coarser work, less purity of form, and
grosser and clumsier designs.
The paste or clay at times approaches the hardness of "terra-cotta;" at
others it is so soft as to be scratched with a knife, and is easily
broken. Its color varies: the earlier or Archaic period is mostly of a
pale lemon-color; the clay used at Athens and Melos was a pale red; and
in the best period of Greece the color becomes a warm orange; while
those found in Italy usually called Etruscan are always of a dull,
rather pale, red. Upon these grounds figures were painted in black,
brown, yellow, and red.
[Illustration: FIG. 39.--_Amphora._]
Perspective those true artists did not strive after. The Greeks sketched
in their designs in clean lines, and colored them with flat color,
touching the muscles and articulations here and there to bring out more
fully the action; but to rival the painter upon his canvas, that was not
attempted upon pottery. It seems desirable to give some notion, as well
as can be done in black-and-white, of what the earlier vases were like;
and we, therefore, transcribe here some examples given by Birch, which
show, not only the style of the decoration, but the forms, of the
Archaic period (see Fig. 31).
The animals shown are rude and clumsy, and are arranged in bands, which
are sown with flower-shapes without order or meaning. The forms, too,
of the pots themselves, especially the two largest, are wholly lacking
in that fine, subtile grace which marks them during the time of the
"Fine Style." That the Art of Greece was not born full-grown and perfect
like the goddess Minerva is certain; but that it grew and grew fast to
its perfectness in that most keen and cunning Greek brain is also
certain.
The time of the "Fine Style" was the time of Pericles, of Aspasia, of
Æschylus, of Phidias; the time when the most beautiful of the beautiful
Greek temples was built on the Acropolis sacred to Minerva; when
sculpture, painting, poetry, and architecture, reached their height;
when the human form and the human face arrived at such a divine beauty
as they had never reached since the days of paradise, and have not again
reached. In this wonderful time the Greek vase was born into its perfect
form.
Some peculiarities of the old or Archaic style, after it passed the
simple method of decoration already described, and when it began to
treat the human figure, are thus specified by Mr. Birch: "The faces of
the females are white to indicate superior delicacy of complexion, and
the pupils of their eyes, which are more elongated than those of the
male figures, are red. The eyes of the men are engraved and of a form
inclining to oval, the pupils circular. The eyes of the women are
sometimes made like those of men, especially on those vases on which the
faces are colored black upon a white ground. The forms are rather full
and muscular, the noses long, the eyes oblique and in profile, the pupil
as if seen in front, the extremities long and not carefully finished,
the outlines rigid, the attitudes _à plomb_, the knees and elbows
rectangular, the draperies stiff, and describing perpendicular, angular,
and precise oval lines. The faces are generally in profile, full faces
being very rare."
We quote again as to the work upon the Fine style: "In this the figures
are still red, and the black grounds are occasionally very dark and
lustrous. The ornaments are in white, and so are the letters. The
figures have lost that hardness which at first characterized them; the
eyes are no longer represented oblique and in profile; the extremities
are finished with greater care, the chin and nose are more rounded, and
[Illustration: FIG. 40.--_Krater (Vase Campanienne), from the Louvre._]
have lost the extreme elongation of the earlier school. The limbs are
fuller and thicker, the faces noble, the hair of the head and beard
treated with greater breadth and mass, as in the style of the painter
Zeuxis, who gave more flesh to his figures, in order to make them appear
of greater breadth and more grandiose, adopting the ideas of Homer, who
represents even his females of large proportions. The great charm of
these designs is the beauty of the composition and the more perfect
proportion of the figures. The head is oval, three-quarters of which are
comprised from the chin to the ear, thus affording a guide to its
proportions, which are far superior to those of the previous figures.
The disproportionate shape of the limbs disappears, and the countenance
assumes its natural form and expression. The folds of the drapery, too,
are freer, and the attitudes have lost their ancient rigidity. The
figures are generally large, and arranged in groups of two or three on
each side, occupying about two-thirds of the height of the vase."
The design we have given to illustrate in some degree the "Fine Style"
is the "Departure of Achilles" (Fig. 32), taken from a vase in the
Louvre.
In our modern time it has come to pass that men worship strength, power,
words, gold, brass--everything but beauty. They care little to have
beautiful things about them, less to be beautiful themselves, to create
beautiful children, or to do beautiful work. And what is the result?
Often they are as unlovely in their souls as in their persons; and so,
while we boast of great cities, and long railways, and amazing
cotton-mills, we boast not of beautiful men who make beautiful work.
Perfection tends to perfection, and ugliness to ugliness. Therefore, let
the perfect man and the perfect woman marry, that thus we may have the
perfect race once more. To bring this to pass we must insist upon
perfect form and perfect decoration in all things about us; we must know
beauty and value it. One step to this great end is to study the Greek
vase. The next step is to make every home a temple of art.
What can we not believe of such a house as that of Aspasia in Athens,
when she was virtually the wife of Pericles in the best period of
Greece? That it was graced surely by works of divinest beauty; that
these exquisite vases which we are praising stood upon her shelves,
graced her pedestals, and adorned the corners specially made for their
reception. We may believe that the potters themselves presented their
beautiful work to the most distinguished woman of all Greece; that the
victor in the Panathenaic games should ask a place for his prize in the
atmosphere of light and learning which surrounded this remarkable woman.
The shapes and uses of the Greek vases, cups, jugs, etc., etc., are
many. We mention here those most known as follows: for holding oil,
wine, etc., etc., _amphora_, _pelice_, _stamnos_; for carrying water,
etc., _hydria_, _kalpis_, or _calpis_; for mixing wine and water, etc.,
_krater_, _oxybaphon_, _kelebe_; for pouring water, wine, etc.,
_oenochoe_, _cruche_, or _kruche_, _olpe_, _prochoos_; for cups and
drinking-vessels, _cylix_, or _kylix_, _kantharos_, _kyathos_, _rhyton_,
_skyphos_, _phiale_, etc., etc.; for perfumes, ointments, etc.,
_lekythos_, or _lecythos_, _alabastron_, _cotyle_, or _kotyle_,
_aryballos_, etc.
[Illustration: FIG. 4.--_Hydria._]
The vases most known are these:
The _amphora_ (Figs. 36, 37, 38, 39), a name applied to vases with two
handles, sometimes with a pointed base to thrust into the ground or to
be set into a tripod; great numbers of these exist, and in various
shapes, some of which will appear in our illustrations.
The _amphoræ_ were used to hold wine, oil, wheat, and a great variety of
other articles.
The _hydria_ (Figs. 41 and 42) and _kalpis_ were used to carry water.
The former has one handle.
The _krater_ or _crater_ (Fig. 40) was a large, open-mouthed vessel used
for mixing wine with water.
The _cruche_ (Fig. 43) and _oeochoe_ were jugs or pitchers used to pour
liquids at the symposia.
The _kylix_ or _cylix_ (Figs. 33 and 34), the _rhyton_ (Fig. 35), and
the _kyathos_, were drinking-cups used at feasts.
The _lekythos_, and _kotyle_ and _alabastron_, were used for perfumes,
pomatums, and other such luxuries for the bath and the toilet; and we
may believe, from the number of these found, that woman in those antique
days was careful to enhance her charms.
[Illustration: FIG. 42.--_Hydria._]
We give two examples of the cylix or kylix used for a drinking-cup,
which always carried two handles. The first (Fig. 33) is of the earliest
period, and is more severe than the last. It is ornamented with the
Greek fret, with zigzags or chevrons, etc., etc., of simple design.
The other (Fig. 34) is more graceful and finished in form, and has a
more elaborate design, which, however, seems to me quite behind the work
found on the cups of the "Fine Style."
[Illustration: FIG. 43.--_Vase for Libations._]
We give some particulars of the Greek vases, mostly from the collections
of the Louvre at Paris.
Some of the AMPHORÆ were designed for particular uses; as, for example,
for prizes to the victors of the public games (Fig. 36). The fashion
which prevails with us of giving cups for prizes at our races, etc.
(usually pieces of silver), is a fashion which began with the Greeks,
and has continued till to-day.
Sometimes these vases were filled with oil made from the olive blessed
by Minerva. We may well believe such amphoræ so won were highly valued;
and this will explain the curious history of the one now in the Museum
of the Louvre.
In 1827 this good find came to light: "They recently found at Capoue the
vase given to the victor at the athletic games at Athens in the year 332
before Christ. Beside the vase lay the skeleton of the victor, the
Athenian himself, as was supposed. The vase is of clay covered with
paintings, showing upon one side the goddess Pallas Athene (Fig. 36)
launching a javelin; on the other side is a group of wrestlers, a young
man who is a looker-on, a judge, and an old man holding a wand. At the
top is found the name of the ruler of Athens in the year 332 B. C., and
the words '_Prize given at Athens_.'" The victor is vanquished, his name
and fame are forgot, but the vase is perfect after the lapse of
twenty-two centuries.
The vase next presented (Fig. 37) is an amphora decorated with
equestrian figures, marked by that archaic stiffness which some value.
Its height is put by Figuier at thirty-seven centimetres--about fifteen
inches. The color is yellowish; it is shaped with much care; the black
varnish is brilliant, and is laid upon the yellow body; the outlines are
incised to limit the figures; and the parts in relief are of a rusty red
and unpolished.
The great amphora (Fig. 38) is in the Louvre Museum, and is one of the
most perfect known. We see this form, as well as many others of the
Greek amphora, in all modern work. The clay is yellowish, and is covered
with a deep black. The figures are reserved on the yellow and are well
brought out by the black. The simplicity and dignity of this vase can
hardly be excelled, and they are in striking contrast with the
over-decorated things, so many of which have been made at Sèvres and
Meissen. The great virtue of reticence was known and observed among the
Greek artists.
The next (Fig. 39) is of a more uncommon form than the others, in its
swelling out at the base. The handles, too, are rare, and the twisting
together at the top quite peculiar.
The great vase KRATER (Fig. 40), called "Campanienne," is some fifteen
inches in height, and is perfect in form and decoration. The figures are
painted in black upon its surface. They have been found in great numbers
in various parts of Italy.
The hydria (Figs. 41 and 42) is a water-jug; another term which is used
for the same vessel is _kalpis_, but the latter has two handles. These
vary much in form, decoration, and beauty. The one (Fig. 41) has a black
ground with red figures; the other (Fig. 42) is just the reverse.
[Illustration: FIG. 44.--_Lekythos._]
The _cruche_ or vase shown in Fig. 43 is supposed to have been used for
libations when sacrifices were made to the gods. The neck and mouth are
peculiar. This example has a red body covered with a black varnish, the
designs showing the red.
The LEKYTHOS is a sort of cylindrical amphora, with a straight neck and
a single handle. This beautiful vase was made to contain perfumes and
unguents, which were largely in use.
The figure (44) here given is a perfect example of this delicate vase,
and is painted with colored clays, which are fixed to the body of the
vase by heat, and are, therefore, indestructible.
[Illustration: FIG. 45.--_Pot for Infusion._]
A pot for infusion (Fig. 45) is easily understood. It is a Greek
ancestor to our teapot, and is marked by that elegance of form which
appears in much of the work of the Grecian potters.
The curious cup (Fig. 46) called a COUTHON is about eight inches in
diameter. Our illustration shows at A the top of the cup with the open
centre, while at B and C may be seen the peculiar involuted form. Just
what uses this could have been put to does not appear. It is more an
object of curiosity and gracefulness than of use. Just in what way such
a pot can have been turned is not plain to the uninitiated soul.
The CUP OF ARCESILAUS (shown in Figs. 47 and 48) is one of the most
graceful and beautiful things which has come down to us from the Greeks.
It is supposed to date back to the time of Pindar, some 500 years before
Christ. The cup is now to be seen in the collection of the Rue de
Richelieu in Paris; it was found in Etruria, but was made by a potter of
Cyrene. It is discovered that at this African city was a great pottery
for the making of Greek vases, out of which have come some of the most
perfect found; among them this one. So far had the art and culture of
the Greeks spread even then. The cup is about thirteen inches in
diameter. Its name comes from the King of Cyrenaica, whose glories were
sung by Pindar. The clay is very fine, and is of a delicate red; and
this has been almost hidden by a black which appears solidly at the
handles and foot. The design is put on with a colored clay or _engobe_
of a yellowish-white, which is fixed by the fire; and it is believed
that it must have passed through the furnace some three times.
The picture (Fig. 48) is curious and interesting. The king is shown
sitting on the deck of a vessel afloat, holding his sceptre. Before him
his servants are weighing baskets of merchandise, and below the deck
others are seen carrying away the baskets into the hold. Now, what is
this they are weighing and carrying away?
[Illustration: FIG. 46.--_A Couthon._]
M. de Witte, in making his catalogue, decides that the Greek word near
the manager who is pointing to the scales means _silphium_ or
_asafoetida_: the most odious of flavors to us, but one which still
provokes delicious titillations in some Orientals. Altogether, we get a
glimpse of life in this early Pindaric time; we see that a king then was
not a mere figure-head, but a real king who oversaw his cargoes, and
probably loved asafoetida, and was fond of making money, as some of
our sovereigns are to-day.
The _number_ of these vases, cups, etc., now existing in Europe is very
great--at least 20,000, and some experts make the number as high as
70,000. The best-known collections are--at Naples in the Museo
Borbonico, 2,000; in the Vatican at Rome, 1,000; at Florence, 700; at
Turin, 500; at Vienna, 300; at Berlin, 1,690; at Munich, 1,700; at
Dresden, 200; at Carlsruhe, 200; at Paris, the Louvre, 1,500;
Bibliothèque Nationale, 500; at London, British Museum, 2,600. There are
also a great many in private collections throughout the world.
What the keen and artistic mind wants to know is, not only what fine
work was done by the Greeks, but why they did it--what, indeed, made
that life more beautiful than any we find in all the earlier histories
of man.
Through the wrecks and convulsions of time this crowd of delicate,
perishable things still exists; what vast numbers must have been made
and destroyed in the varying populations of Greece, Rome, Tyre,
Carthage, and wherever Grecian civilizations and tastes made their way,
it is not easy for the mind to compass. And we must remember that these
things we now describe were not in every man's hand; they were in a good
degree for the rich and well-to-do. No slave (and slaves then abounded)
used a _kylix_ from which to drink his wine, nor an _oenochoe_ from which
to pour it.
That vases and cups were used and made especially as tokens of affection
to be placed in the tombs, we know; that they were fashioned and painted
for prizes at the Panathenaic games of Greece, we know; and that they
were used in many ways in the symposia and feasts, we also know; and the
numbers made must have been nigh countless. No satisfactory explanation
of this profusion has so far been hit upon.
The potteries, of course, must have been many; for Brongniart cites in
Greece proper twelve now known cities where vases were made; in Italy,
some fourteen; and we know, also, that they were made in most
[Illustration: FIG. 47.--_Cup of Arcesilaus, View of the Outside._]
of the colonies where Greek customs stamped themselves. The demand for
all this product was, of course, equal to the supply. While we know that
Greek civilizations had reached a high place, and that man, physically
and intellectually, had come nigh to perfection, _woman_ had not kept
pace with him. The home then was not what we now make it, or attempt to,
a temple in which all of comfort, all of luxury, all of beauty, are
gathered. The Greek house, even in Athens, was rarely, large; the
principal _salons_ for the feasts were used only by men, for the ladies
of the house did not appear at those times. The women's apartments were
more secluded, and were not used for show; we should not, therefore,
expect them to be _filled_ with objects of art and ornament, though they
would not, of course, be excluded. That there should be, as we have
shown there was, a great production of articles devoted to the tastes of
the fairer sex is easy to understand, and for them, as well as for men,
were made the beautiful _lekythoi_, the _alabastron_, and other
articles, for perfumes, for the toilet, and the bath; for these we can
account. The life of the married woman was not then passed in public and
out-of-doors as it now has come to be; she was not the central or only
or principal figure around which society revolved; nor did the social or
intellectual, the artistic or literary life find its centre or its
applause with her. That she frequented the theatres with men is not
believed, though she had her own opportunities for the indulgence of
this taste; and it seems probable that some representations--as the
tragedies--were open for both men and women. Her life partook of the
seclusion which stamped the Asiatic courts. She had many duties and
occupations; for the wife, with her maidens or her slaves, not only must
prepare and serve the food, she must also spin and weave and make the
garments for her household.
[Illustration: FIG. 48.--_Cup of Arcesilaus, View of the Inside._]
The care and education of children, the supervision of the house and the
slaves, the production of stuffs and garments, of perfumes and unguents,
gave necessary occupations in great profusion, and such as would
alleviate _ennui_--such as would put amusements into a second rather
than a first place in her heart.
But the truth is that her life was so dull, so devoid of exciting cares,
that many women, and among them some of the most beautiful, most witty,
and most cultivated of Greece, preferred the seductive and exciting
dangers of the life of the _hetaira_ to the safe and frigid
respectability and dullness of the married wife.
[Illustration: FIG. 49.--_Etruscan Vase._]
That dress was a matter of important thought with woman there also, is
beyond doubt; and the textures of the _chitons_ and _himations_, the
proper colors of their bands and their girdles, caused much perplexity
to the beautiful Greek maiden, as they have to the beautiful American of
to-day. But the Greek seems to have escaped one great misery and
mystery--_her fashions did not change_; no staff of designing men was
working with swift brain, hand, and pencil, in Athens or Corinth, to
perplex her delicate mind with fashion-books, thus forcing her into
exquisite torture, and keeping her there. The pictures upon the vases
continuing through many centuries, show no very marked changes in dress.
Was woman, then, supremely happy? Who can say! Besides dress, there can
be no question, from the large numbers of perfume-bottles and vases of
clay, as well as from the quantity of those of glass found by Cesnola in
his excavations, that a very great degree of luxury, if not of dandyism,
was reached by the women as well as the men in that "good old day of
Greece." We know something of the luxury, the lavish daintiness of
Alcibiades and his friends, but very little of that of their wives.
There was, however, an evil thing in Greece, and one which the Greek
wife felt strongly, keenly--it was the _hetairai_, the _demi-monde_ of
the great cities. Nowhere except in England and America has the virtue
of married woman been held at so extreme and exalted a height, nowhere
has its sale been lowered to such a depth, as in Athens.
Among the _hetairai_ of Athens and Corinth were found the most
beautiful, the most brilliant, and the most highly-cultivated women of
Greece; to them every attraction was of inestimable value, and whatever
would charm men was to be sought and seized. That among them were women
of great mental gifts, of much political knowledge, of highly-cultivated
artistic perceptions, we have every reason to believe; that the
_hetairai_ made their houses as attractive as possible we may also
believe; and in them, we do not doubt, were found some of the best
examples of the art of Greece outside the temples and the gymnasia. Here
we may suppose that the fine vases found appreciative recipients, as
well as appreciative admirers among men. That all who sold their charms
were what we term "abandoned" is not true; they did not so consider
themselves, and were not so esteemed among the men or women of Greece;
that some of them, many of them, became so, is beyond doubt true. But
among them some (how many who can tell?) were cultivated, interesting,
able, there is no doubt; and that they continued so. It was long the
fashion to suppose and to say that the poetess Sappho, and the
politician Aspasia, were courtesans, which hardly any man will now
maintain. As to the former less is known, but Aspasia, though not
legally married to Pericles (as she could not be), was virtually his
wife and partner through all his life, in his schemes for governing,
exalting, and beautifying Athens. Her house then was the most beautiful,
the most complete, and the most attractive, in Athens; and to it
resorted the most noted statesmen, rhetoricians, philosophers, wits, and
artists, of that most remarkable city and time.
[Illustration: FIG. 50.--_Etruscan Vase._]
It is a misfortune to us that no Greek house of the time of
[Illustration: FIG. 51.--_Etruscan Vase._]
Pericles, the perfect day of a most remarkable and highly-æsthetic
civilization, remains; either its stone-walls, or in pictures on its
temple-walls or on its vases. The great catastrophe which overwhelmed
Herculaneum and Pompeii has secured to us the means of knowing how the
luxurious Roman lived in those little seaside cities eighteen hundred
years ago; a time when Cæsar was hardly dead, and Jesus almost unknown.
Every house in Athens and in Corinth, in Samos and in Melos, has been
swept away by the besom of war or the feathered wing of Time. We know
what we do know from the verses of the poets or the allusions of the
playwrights, and that is all; but from these we gather that the house or
home was a place rather for the woman than for the man; that in it the
woman, though not exactly a prisoner as in the harems of the Asiatic
kings, was expected to stay and to find "her sphere." The porter sat at
the door of the house, and when the woman walked forth she went
accompanied by her slave, and it was known for what she went.
The life of the Greek man was essentially and in his best hours outside
his own house. By the Greek man we now mean the upper or more wealthy
classes; all these had their work done by slaves. He went forth in the
early morning to visit the theatres, where he was entertained with the
dramas of Æschylus, of Euripides, of Aristophanes; he breakfasted; he
visited the markets; he went to the bath; to the hairdresser; he
conversed in the porticoes; he frequented the gymnasia, where he could
talk or listen, where he could exercise and enjoy his body, where
beautiful bodies and philosophic tongues found free play and ample room.
Everything of politics, of poetry, of art, of scandal, was a delight to
the keen and active intellect of the Greek; as in St. Paul's day, he was
eager to hear or see some new thing: and when such a ruler as Pericles
had grasped the purse and the sword, and had gathered together in the
small city of Athens all the sculptures, all the poetry, all the
eloquence, all the pictures, all the vases, to adorn and glorify it, the
Greek man may be said--using our expressive American phrase--"to have
had a good time!"--as good as he has been able yet to see in the long
history of the race.
[Illustration: FIG. 52.--_Etruscan Vase._]
Knowing as much as we do of the life of the Greek man and the Greek
woman, need we be surprised that the rather sharp-tempered Xantippe,
wife of that delightful vagabond and philosopher, Socrates--he who
puzzled the too conscious sophists and pleased the simpler people, who
loved the true and hated the false; he who lived for wisdom and not for
power; who cared much for mind and less for money; who basked in the
sunshine of the porticoes and pined in the shadows of his own
house--need we be surprised that this wife of his was driven to go forth
at times to seek her vagrant lord in the throng of the market-place or
the excitements of the Academy, and to lead him thence to the place of
his wife and children? Need we be surprised that her speech was then
unmelodious, unconjugal, and that she became a sport and by-word for the
wicked wits of that brilliant city?
[Illustration: FIG. 53.--_Etruscan Vase._]
But with his faults Socrates had the great virtues of serenity and
patience, always indispensable in the married man, at least.
If the vases had only preserved for us the portraits of Xantippe and
Socrates, or even of the room they lived in, how much would we thank
them! As to the _pictures_ upon the vases, the best of them seem to be
copied or adapted by the vase-painters from pictures of the best artists
of Greece, made to illustrate the worship or the doings of the gods, the
great deeds of the heroes, the feats at games, the triumphs at the
feasts, etc., etc. Many of these are but carelessly, even poorly, put
upon the vases; the _best_ are those we must look for to admire, to
enjoy, and to emulate.
The _tub of Diogenes_, there is reason to believe, was a great earthen
vase or pot--the PITHOS. These were built up of clay by the Greeks by
hand around a frame, and were afterward baked. As they sometimes reached
the dimensions of over three feet in diameter and six or seven feet in
height, it is plain that they could not be turned upon the potter's
wheel. It is easy, too, to understand what an excellent shelter such a
pot would make for such a cynical philosopher as Diogenes, who needed a
very cheap rent. But if a wicked boy _should_ throw a cruel stone some
fine evening, striking the pot in a weak spot, the rent might end in a
convulsion and ruin.
ETRUSCAN VASES.--The "_Etruscan vase_" not being what we have here
described and figured as the "Greek vase," it remains to say briefly
that the vases and pots made by the Etruscans before the coming of the
Greek potters were quite different; ruder and less fine in form and in
decoration. Indeed, it is not likely that the painted vase found in
Italy, known as the Greek vase, was ever the work of the Etruscan
workmen. The Etruscan pottery was thicker, less ornamental, and it
indicates a different race and lower æsthetic development. In the Museum
of Art at Boston is now placed a collection of Etruscan work which is
said to be unique in this country as well as in England. In this are a
number of vases which are ornamented with heads and figures in relief,
not sharp and fine; these are wholly covered with a black color. A few
which are painted are quite different and inferior to the work of the
Greeks. The collection was secured in Italy by Mr. J. J. Dixwell, who
has been so good as to present it to the museum. Figs. 49, 50, 51, 52,
53, are examples of some of the vases in the Museum of the Louvre, which
present the general style and character of this work; they show clearly
how much the real Etruscan vase differs from the true Greek vase.