Winkelmann has brought to his work, together with immense reading and an
extensive and subtle knowledge of art, that noble confidence of the old
masters which led them to devote all their attention to the main object,
treating all secondary matters with what seems like studied neglect, or
abandoning them altogether to any chance hand.
A man may take no little credit to himself for having committed only
such errors as anybody might have avoided. They force themselves upon
our notice at the first hasty reading; and my only excuse for commenting
on them is that I would remind a certain class of persons, who seem to
think no one has eyes but themselves, that they are trifles not worthy
of comment.
In his writings on the imitation of the Greek works of art, Winkelmann
had before allowed himself to be misled by Junius, who is, indeed, a
very deceptive author. His whole work is a cento, and since his rule is
to quote the ancients in their very words, he not infrequently applies
to painting passages which in their original connection had no bearing
whatever on the subject. When, for instance, Winkelmann would tell us
that the highest effect in art, as in poetry, cannot be attained by the
mere imitation of nature, and that poet as well as painter should choose
an impossibility which carries probability with it rather than what is
simply possible, he adds: “This is perfectly consistent with Longinus’
requirement of possibility and truth from the painter in opposition to
the incredibility which he requires from the poet.” Yet the addition was
unfortunate, for it shows a seeming contradiction between the two great
art critics which really does not exist. Longinus never said what is
here attributed to him. Something similar he does say with regard to
eloquence and poetry, but by no means of poetry and painting. Ὡς δ’
ἕτερόν τι ἡ ῥητορικὴ φαντασία βούλεται, καὶ ἕτερον ἡ παρὰ ποιηταῖς, οὐκ
ἂν λάθοι σε, οὐδ’ ὅτι τῆς μὲν ἐν ποιήσει τέλος ἐστὶν ἔκπληξις, τῆς δ’ ἐν
λόγοις ἐνάργεια, he writes to his friend Terentian;[189] and again, Οὐ
μὴν ἀλλὰ τὰ μὲν παρὰ τοῖς ποιηταῖς μυθικωτέραν ἔχει τὴν ὑπερέκπτωσιν,
καὶ πάντη τὸ πιστὸν ὑπεραίρουσαν· τῆς δὲ ῥητορικῆς φαντασίας, κάλλιστον
ἀεὶ τὸ ἔμπρακτον καὶ ἐνάληθές.[190]
But Junius interpolates here painting instead of oratory, and it was in
his writings, not in those of Longinus, that Winkelmann read: “Præsertim
cum poeticæ phantasiæ finis sit ἔκπληξις, pictoriæ vero, ἐνάργεια, καὶ
τὰ μὲν παρὰ τοῖς ποιηταῖς, ut loquitur idem Longinus,” &c.[191] The
words of Longinus, to be sure, but not his meaning.
The same must have been the case with the following remark:[192] “All
motions and attitudes of Greek figures which were too wild and fiery to
be in accordance with the character of wisdom, were accounted as faults
by the old masters and classed by them under the general name of
_parenthyrsus_.” The old masters? There can be no authority for that
except Junius. _Parenthyrsus_ was a word used in rhetoric, and, as a
passage in Longinus would seem to show, even there peculiar to
Theodorus.[193] Τούτῳ παρακεῖται τρίτον τι κακίας εἶδος ἐν τοῖς
παθητικοῖς, ὅπερ ὁ Θεόδωρος παρένθυρσον ἐκάλει· ἔστι δὲ πάθος ἄκαιρον
καὶ κενόν, ἔνθα μὴ δεῖ πάθους· ἢ ἄμετρον, ἔνθα μετρίου δεῖ.
I doubt, indeed, whether this word can be translated into the language
of painting. For in oratory and poetry pathos can be carried to extreme
without becoming _parenthyrsus_, which is only the extreme of pathos in
the wrong place. But in painting the extreme of pathos would always be
_parenthyrsus_, whatever its excuse in the circumstances of the persons
concerned.
So, also, various errors in the “History of Art” have arisen solely from
Winkelmann’s haste in accepting Junius instead of consulting the
original authors. When, for instance, he is citing examples to show that
excellence in all departments of art and labor was so highly prized by
the Greeks, that the best workman, even on an insignificant thing, might
immortalize his name, he brings forward this among others:[194] “We know
the name of a maker of very exact balances or scales; he was called
Parthenius.” Winkelmann must have read the words of Juvenal, “lances
Parthenio factas,” which he here appeals to, only in Junius’s catalogue.
Had he looked up the original passage in Juvenal, he would not have been
misled by the double meaning of the word “lanx,” but would at once have
seen from the connection that the poet was not speaking of balances or
scales, but of plates and dishes. Juvenal is praising Catullus for
throwing overboard his treasures during a violent storm at sea, in order
to save the ship and himself. In his description of these treasures, he
says:—
Ille nec argentum dubitabat mittere, lances
Parthenio factas, urnæ cratera capacem
Et dignum sitiente Pholo, vel conjuge Fusci.
Adde et bascaudas et mille escaria, multum
Cælati, biberet quo callidus emtor Olynthi.
What can the “lances” be which are here standing among drinking-cups and
bowls, but plates and dishes? And what does Juvenal mean, except that
Catullus threw overboard his whole silver table-service, including
plates made by Parthenius. “Parthenius,” says the old scholiast,
“cœlatoris nomen” (the name of the engraver). But when Grangäus, in his
annotations, appends to this name, “sculptor, de quo Plinius” (sculptor
spoken of by Pliny), he must have been writing at random, for Pliny
speaks of no artist of that name.
“Yes,” continues Winkelmann, “even the name of the saddler, as we should
call him, has been preserved, who made the leather shield of Ajax.” This
he cannot have derived from the source to which he refers his
readers,—the life of Homer, by Herodotus. Here, indeed, the lines from
the Iliad are quoted wherein the poet applies to this worker in leather
the name Tychius. But it is at the same time expressly stated that this
was the name of a worker in leather of Homer’s acquaintance, whose name
he thus introduced in token of his friendship and gratitude.[195]
Ἀπέδωκε δὲ χάριν καὶ Τυχίῳ τῷ σκύτει. ὃς ἐδέξατο αὐτὸν ἐν τῷ Νέῳ τείχει,
προσελθόντα πρὸς τὸ σκύτειον, ἐν τοῖς ἔπεσι καταζεύξας ἐν τῇ Ἰλιάδι
τοῖσδε:
Αἴας δ’ ἐγγύθεν ἦλθε, φέρων σάκος ἠΰτε πύργον,
χάλκεον, ἑπταβόειον· ὅ οἱ Τύχιος κάμε τεύχων
σκυτοτόμων ὄχ’ ἄριστος, Ὕλῃ ἔνι οἰκία ναίων·[196]
Here we have exactly the opposite of what Winkelmann asserts. So utterly
forgotten, even in Homer’s time, was the name of the saddler who made
the shield of Ajax, that the poet was at liberty to substitute that of a
perfect stranger.
Various other little errors I have found which are mere slips of memory,
or concern things introduced merely as incidental illustrations.
For instance, it was Hercules, not Bacchus, who, as Parrhasius boasts,
appeared to him in the same shape he had given him on the canvas.[197]