found their best clients abroad, and left no successors of importance
at home. The political loss of power was here intensified by a growing
poverty. The new wealth which began to pour into Europe as the result
of the conquest of Asia went either to Macedonia or to those states
which had sent mercenaries to Alexander’s army. The future prosperity
of Greece was in the hands of Arcadia, Achaia, and Aetolia rather than
Argos, Sparta, and Sikyon. The new states had few artistic traditions,
and the old states had no means of gratifying theirs. The inevitable
result was a great decline in artistic output as well as in artistic
skill. Almost the only sphere left for sculpture was the erection of
formal honorary statues to distinguished or wealthy individuals, a type
of work which does not beget great art.
[Illustration: 39]
[Illustration: 40]
[Illustration: 41]
The first half of the third century was a period of very good work in
portraiture, which is, however, a subject by itself. The Demosthenes
of Polyeuctes is dated about 280 B.C., and the statues of Aeschines,
Aristotle, and others show the existence of an admirable school of
portrait sculptors at this time in Athens. But ideal sculpture shows
a sad falling-off. The Themis of Chairestratos (Fig. 40) belongs
approximately to this period, and it is marked by a great formality,
not only in pose but in the treatment of hair and drapery. The
classical period of sculpture in Athens was followed by what we must
call an academic period. The foreign schools were developing on lines
of naturalism, but at home sculptors tended merely to formalize
the work of the fourth-century masters, and to produce statues of
mechanical correctness without any vitality at all. We have seen the
beginning of this tendency in the drapery system of the followers of
Praxiteles. It now affects the whole of Attic sculpture. Old types
are adopted again and again, until they become purely mechanical.
Drapery styles are similarly used up, and the increasing formality of
every department stifles entirely the possibilities of originality.
The Hermes of Andros (Fig. 39) is a good example of this kind of
crystallization of types. The statue was found in connexion with a
tomb, and it is clearly a memorial statue. Its companion was a female
figure reproducing exactly the pose and drapery of the draped
female figure from Herculaneum at Dresden. The date would seem to be
late third century. The Hermes itself is a replica of a type known in
the Antinous of the Belvedere and other statues, and is a product of
the Praxitelean school, like the Dresden figure. But the influence
of Praxiteles is not alone in it. We have a clear use of Lysippic
proportions and some Lysippic influence in the head. This eclecticism
is an invariable mark of archaistic art. The sculptor, who has no new
message of his own to deliver, looks back to antiquity for his types,
but does not imitate one statue directly. The only form of originality
which he is able to use is originality of combination and selection.
Consequently he absorbs details from several artists and produces
work which we label Lysippo-Scopaic, or Lysippo-Praxitelean, &c. We
have seen how the late fourth-century artists in Asia Minor combined
characteristics of Scopas and Praxiteles. The late fourth-century
and third-century Attic artists made use of all their predecessors,
and produced statues in which we can detect the _disiecta membra_ of
half a dozen styles. At the same time we may recognize the general
predominance of Praxitelean tradition over that of the other artists
and a universal predilection for marble instead of bronze.
One of the most interesting Hellenistic works of the Attic school is
the bronze figure from Anticythera,[87] which is still the subject of
much dispute. It is a typical piece of eclecticism. The pose and twist
of the shoulder and upper part of the torso are Lysippic, while the
head is a mixture of Praxiteles and Scopas. The result, as might be
expected, is somewhat inharmonious. In shape and profile the head is
mainly Praxitelean, and therefore on its discovery it was acclaimed
as a Praxitelean original. But looking from the front we at once see
the resemblance to the Scopaic Meleager type,[88] with its broad head,
slight chin, and fringe of short upright locks like little flames. The
head, and indeed the whole statue, is not unlike the bronze athlete of
Ephesos,[89] which has the same hair and facial type, together with a
similar rather heavy Lysippic body. This heaviness of the torso in both
statues shows that the Lysippic ideal is not followed directly, but
rather the Attic version of it as used in the Agias of Delphi.[90]
Another Attico-Lysippic figure is preserved for us in a number of
replicas, of which the two best known are the Hermes from Atalanta in
Athens (Fig. 41) and the Hermes Richelieu in the Louvre. Here again
Lysippic proportions are combined with a rather heavier Attic torso in
a whole which lacks something of harmony and repose. The work has been
referred back to a Lysippic original, but it seems more likely that
it is an Attic adaptation of the eclectic school now springing into
existence. The Attic grave reliefs give us good information about Attic
art down to the end of the fourth century, but Demetrios of Phaleron
prohibited them for sumptuary reasons in 309 B.C., and in future we
have no such good guide to Attic art. Eclecticism is, however, pretty
clear in the later examples which we do possess. The votive reliefs
from the Asklepieion throw some light on the third century, but they
are not on a sufficiently large scale to be very instructive.
[Illustration: 42]
In Greece at all times professions tended to run in one family, and
we have already seen examples of families of sculptors, such as
that of Praxiteles, in which the craft was handed down from father
to son for generations. The Hellenistic age is full of evidence for
this phenomenon in Athens and elsewhere. Rhodes in particular gives
us detailed families of sculptors, since we are better provided
with inscriptions in Rhodes than in other centres. In Hellenistic
Athens two such families are worthy of notice. Polykles, whom we
may call Polykles I, had two sons, Timokles and Timarchides I; the
latter had two sons, Polykles II and Dionysios; and Polykles II had
a son, Timarchides II. These are known to us from literature or from
inscriptions, and they cover more or less the second century B.C. It
is a question to which member of the house we are to ascribe the very
famous bronze Hermaphrodite mentioned by Pliny,[91] or whether it
should be referred to an earlier artist of the same name in the fourth
century.[92] A further question is involved in the identification of
the Hermaphrodite, since it is commonly assumed that the Sleeping
Hermaphrodite (Fig. 42), far the most famous type now extant in
numerous copies, must have had a marble and not a bronze original. The
statue of Polykles is identified with the Berlin Hermaphrodite[93]
by those who would give him a fourth-century date; with a bronze in
Epinal[94] by those who associate him with Hellenistic art. The Berlin
Hermaphrodite is of Praxitelean type; the Epinal bronze resembles
rather what we have called the Pergamene type of the Turning Satyr and
the Aphrodite Kallipygos. The question is a difficult one, but we may
safely exclude Polykles II. Timarchides I, his father, and Dionysios,
his brother, worked on statues of a marked academic tendency. The C.
Ofellius of Delos was the work of his brother, a statue of purely
mechanical taste. This Polykles is not likely to have originated a
great and famous statue. Polykles I worked as early as 200, a much
better period for original work. He is a more likely candidate for the
authorship of the type, if we suppose it to have resembled either the
Epinal bronze or the Sleeping Hermaphrodite. On _a priori_ grounds
of its great popularity one would distinctly prefer to connect the
latter with the statue mentioned by Pliny. It is true that it looks
like a marble statue and not a bronze one, but a marble replica which
served as the prototype for marble copies is by no means an impossible
suggestion. But this Sleeping Hermaphrodite is a work of distinctly
Pergamene tendency, intended to bring out the artist’s skill in the
rendering of soft sensual forms. It would seem to belong to an earlier
date than 200 or even 250. The Epinal bronze implies a similar date,
and therefore we are left with a double difficulty. The best Polykles
for our purpose seems to be fifty years too late for either of the
types we require. We are, therefore, driven to suppose an intermediate
Polykles about 270 B.C. In any case we must infer a reaction of
Pergamene influence on the academic art of third-century Athens, but it
was a solitary example which seems to have left no heritage to later
artists.
[Illustration: 43]
[Illustration: 44]
The sculptor family best known to us from inscriptions is that of
Eucheir and Euboulides. We know of at least two representatives of each
name, Eucheir I about 220, Euboulides I about 190, Eucheir II about
160, and Euboulides II thirty years later. The first Euboulides made a
statue of Chrysophis, the second Eucheir athletes and warriors, and
a marble Hermes at Pheneos. The second Euboulides is more important,
for he was the author of a great monument outside the Dipylon Gate,
considerable fragments of which have been recovered.
These fragments are our main evidence for the art of Athens in the
second half of the second century B.C., and they show us that the
academic art of the second half of the third century has followed out
its natural development. The figures of Victory (Fig. 43) and Athena
(Fig. 44), which have partially survived, are grandiose without being
noble or effective. There is a distinct attempt to absorb some of the
exaggerated idealism of the second Pergamene school; there is also an
effort to recover some of the simplicity and grandeur of Pheidias;
but the result is a staid and rather mechanical classicism, which is
made only a little more obvious by the larger size of the figures. The
Athena head, with its straightforward gaze, archaistic hair, large,
wide-open eyes, and round, heavy chin is distinctly Pheidian; the
Victory in rapid movement with head turned to the side is more affected
by Pergamene art. Her drapery shows a curious combination of naturalism
and formalism in the folds at the girdle; each individual set of folds
is well studied from nature; but the repetition of a similar set right
round the body is purely mechanical. The group is a good example of the
limitations of the Attic artist at the end of his development. The next
century sees a totally different activity.
In the Peloponnese we have a great gap after the pupils of Lysippos,
a gap devoid of any evidence either literary or monumental. During
the whole of the third century it would be difficult to point to any
Peloponnesian art on a scale deserving of attention. But the second
century opens with a name of some importance, Damophon of Messene.
We are in the rare and fortunate position of possessing undoubted
originals from his hand in the great group of Lycosura. These are
practically our sole monumental evidence for the Hellenistic art
of the Peloponnese.[95] The date of Damophon is now established by
inscriptions for the first half of the second century B.C., and a
number of his works are more or less attested by coin-types. He had a
considerable vogue in the last generation before the Roman conquest,
and his leading position is evidenced by the commission he received to
restore the Olympian Zeus. It may have been his hand which touched up
and restored the corner figures of the west pediment of the temple.
The great group of Lycosura represented Demeter and Kore enthroned
between standing figures of Artemis and a Titan Anytos. It survives
in three heads and numerous fragments of limbs and drapery, and its
conjectural restoration has been recently undertaken (Fig. 45). The
discovery of a coin representing the group on its reverse goes far to
justify the proposed design.[96]
[Illustration: 45]
The group is interesting from many points of view, but mainly from
the flood of light which it throws on the methods of Peloponnesian
sculpture at the very close of its development. It thus forms a
complementary picture to the remains of the monument of Euboulides
in Athens. Damophon, like Euboulides, underwent the influence of
Pergamon. The colossal scale of his group and the wild hair of his
giant Anytos (Fig. 46) demonstrate the influence of the altar
frieze. Damophon also went back to Pheidias for inspiration. He must
have absorbed many lessons from his work at Olympia. The seated group
of his goddesses is reminiscent of the two figures next to ‘Theseus’
in the west pediment of the Parthenon. The simple wide-eyed grave
expression of his Demeter head goes back to the fifth-century ideal,
while his Artemis (Fig. 47) wears the melon-coiffure associated with
the school of Praxiteles. The attitudes of Artemis and Anytos are
Lysippic. Here we have every evidence of academic eclecticism. The
same feature is borne out by three coins which reproduce the statues
of Damophon. His Asklepios at Aigion gives us a fourth-century type.
He copied the Laphria of Patras for Messene. His Herakles in the guise
of an Idaean Dactyl at Megalopolis seems to have been a variant of the
now fashionable herm figures and to copy a Hermerakles type known by
numerous extant examples.
Damophon’s style then was academic and eclectic, borrowing from all
sources of inspiration and in general using up over again well-known
groups and poses. His execution is even more interesting for its
extraordinary inequality. His heads are on the whole very good. The
Demeter is a dull piece of work, but both the Anytos and the Artemis
show some fancy and some power of original expression. The girl is
demure and cheerful, the giant benevolent and rather sly. But when we
come to examine the execution of the fragments of the bodies and limbs
which survive at Lycosura, we find a very hasty and poor technical
ability. The arms and legs are nearly shapeless. They are colossal,
but practically formal in design, and details of muscles and sinews
are almost entirely omitted. The drapery makes some effort to follow
Pheidian designs, but it is poorly carved and without effect. Only in
one direction does the artist show any skill, and that is in the great
embroidered veil (Fig. 48) worn by Despoina. This is an extraordinary
_tour de force_, not for its sculptural effect, which is purely
formal, but for the reproduction of a complicated embroidered design
in very low relief. A border of tassels with bands of design about it
and large embroidered figures of Victory above the bands is rendered
with consummate art. We have a frieze of sea-monsters, nymphs, and
Erotes according to a common Hellenistic design, a curious local dance
of beast figures in human dress, a dance paralleled by some small
terra-cotta figures found in the same shrine, and the larger figures of
Victory above carrying candelabra.
It is interesting to see the total want of proportion in the artist’s
mind, who could devote so much time and originality to a comparatively
unimportant piece of decoration, while treating the main lines of
his drapery with carelessness and monotony. It is probable that we
have here a procedure to be noticed in the Demeter of Cnidos--a head
done with great care and placed on a torso of inferior execution.
While Damophon worked the heads of all the figures and the drapery
of Despoina, he must have left the rest of his group to a band of
journeymen assistants. We know from inscriptions that Damophon had two
sons, Xenophilos and another whose name is lost. It is, therefore,
possible that Xenophilos and Straton, the Argive sculptors, were his
sons. Their subjects were similar, and their Asklepios, as shown on a
coin, is identical with Damophon’s.
[Illustration: 46]
[Illustration: 47]
[Illustration: 48]
Thus Greek sculpture on the mainland came to a somewhat inglorious
and academic conclusion with the Roman conquest in 146 B.C. We may
examine one more centre of artistic work before leaving it, since it
forms a link between Greece and Ionia, between the declining schools of
the mainland and the vigorous art of Pergamon and Rhodes.
Melos has left us several Hellenistic statues of interest. The
Aphrodite of the Louvre and the Poseidon in Athens are their most
important representatives. The Poseidon (Fig. 49) is a typical work
of histrionic _bravura_ under the influence of the second Pergamene
school. He stands in a defiant and dramatic attitude as if summoning
his adversaries to combat, and his burly hair and beard recall the
giants of the altar. But an eclectic taste is visible here also. His
pose is Lysippic, and his restrained torso owes more to Rhodes than
Pergamon. Melos is a meeting-point of trade-routes, in which many
artistic currents must have come together.
The Aphrodite of Melos[97] has attained a somewhat undeserved position
as one of the world’s masterpieces of sculpture. Splendid piece of work
as it is, it has most of the faults of its period. Much controversy has
raged even over the actual facts of the discovery of this statue, but
there appears to be no reason to doubt that the inscribed base, which
was found with it and brought perhaps later to Paris, is part of it,
and contains the true record of its author ...sandros from Antioch on
the Maeander.[98] This base has been lost, but drawings and statements
exist to show that it fitted the actual base. The missing fragment had
a rectangular hole on the upper surface, in which some additional
attribute was fitted. The restoration of this missing piece of the
base with its hole disposes of the theories occasionally ventilated
that the statue was one of a pair. The hole is not the socket for
fastening a statue, nor will it hold one of the small herms which
were found with the Aphrodite. Its true significance has been pointed
out by Furtwängler by analogy with several other statues and designs,
including one from Melos and one actual copy of the Aphrodite herself.
It served for the fastening of a slender column or stele on which the
goddess rested her left elbow. A beautiful little fourth-century bronze
in Dresden shows a similar motive. The restoration of the figure is
now easy. With her right hand the goddess held or was about to hold
her drapery to prevent it from slipping; her left elbow rested on the
pillar, and her left hand, palm upwards, held an apple. This hand
holding the apple was actually found with the statue, and undoubtedly
belongs to it, as well as a piece of the upper left arm. The other hand
found at the same time is alien and on a larger scale. The position of
the hand, palm upwards, is certified by the unworked back, which would
be invisible. The apple of course is a frequent symbol of Aphrodite,
and particularly appropriate in the island to which it gave its name.
[Illustration: 49]
[Illustration: 50]
The Aphrodite was found in a niche or exedra, which was dedicated by
one Bacchios with a second-century inscription. The base inscription
of ...sandros, whose name we may guess to have been Agesandros, is
also second century, and therefore we cannot hesitate to accept a date
about 180–160 B.C. for the Aphrodite, especially as its style and
technique are indubitably of that period. The pose may be described as
reminiscent of Lysippos with its opposing lines of shoulders and
hips and twist of the body above the waist. The head-type is Scopaic,
but only Scopaic at second-hand, since the influence of Pergamon
is much clearer. If we compare the head with the head of the girl
in Berlin from Pergamon,[99] or with the Pergamon Hermaphrodite in
Constantinople,[100] we see an identical treatment of hair, identical
head-shape, and the same type of features in almost every detail.
The drapery is interesting for yet another source of inspiration.
Its division into flattish panels separated by groups of deeply-cut
waving folds is in the manner of Pheidias and the late fifth century,
while the naturalistic little detail on the right hip, where the lower
folds are caught up and radiate from a single point, is thoroughly
Hellenistic.
The style of the statue as well as its technique is clear proof of its
date. The attitude of the goddess has no discernible motive. There
is no reason why she should be half naked, or why she should twist
her body round so violently from the hips. There is no explanation
why her drapery should stay up at all in so insecure a position, or
why her left foot should be raised higher than her right. But if we
compare for a moment the Melian Aphrodite with the Capuan Venus in
Naples (Fig. 50), a statue in a nearly identical position, all these
points are explained. The Capuan Venus is half naked, because she is
admiring her beauty in the mirror of the shield of Ares. She is twisted
so as to look at herself in the shield and yet display her body to
the spectator--in itself a Hellenistic device. Her drapery is held
up, because the shield-edge holds it against her left hip; her foot
is raised, because it rests on Ares’ helmet and thereby gives better
support to the shield. The attitude of the Melian goddess is clumsy and
stiff, because it has no motive; that of the Capuan is graceful and
effective, because its motive is clear.
Now it is noteworthy that the many examples of this type in our
possession are all copies of the Capuan and not of the Melian figure.
This is clear from the direction of the drapery folds, which differs
in the Melian from all the other figures. The history of the type is
thereby made clear. It was an early Hellenistic or late fourth-century
statue of the Armed Aphrodite, possibly the cult statue, which
appears in identical pose on coins of Corinth. Itself a typical
_genre_ adaptation of a very early myth, it at once gained favour and
was much copied, especially in Roman times. The Melian goddess was
a second-century Hellenistic copy, but not a mere copy, rather an
adaptation of the earlier prototype to a figure more suitable for Melos
itself. Unfortunately the artist was unable to make the pose suit his
new scheme properly. We get another adaptation in the Augustan age in
the shape of the Victory of Brescia inscribing a roll of the dead on
the shield,[101] and finally, in the second century and later, we get a
crowd of copies much closer to the original, of which the Capuan Venus
is the best.
The history of the Melian Aphrodite throws much light on the
Hellenistic art of the mainland and its neighbouring islands. We
see its artists bankrupt of new ideas, and able only to adapt
older conceptions to new requirements with a series of eclectic
modifications. The Aphrodite is a close parallel to the monuments
of Damophon and Euboulides, although its artist is admittedly a
better sculptor. All three show a poverty of new ideas, but a strong
reaction against the excesses of the later Pergamene school. They are,
therefore, forced to look backward and make up new conceptions out of a
medley of older details. It is of the utmost importance that we should
remember this state of mind when we come to deal with Greco-Roman art.
V
GRECO-ROMAN SCULPTURE