STĀTŬĀRĬA ARS

is in its proper sense the art of making statues or busts, whether they consist of stone or metal or other materials, and includes the art of making the various kinds of reliefs (alto, ba o, and mezzo relievo). These arts in their infant state existed among the Greeks from time immemorial. There is no material applicable to statuary which was not used by the Greeks. As soft clay is capable of being shaped without difficulty into any form, and is easily dried, either by being exposed to the sun or by being baked, we may consider this substance to have been the earliest material of which figures were made. The name plastic art ( ἡ πλαστική ), by which the ancients sometimes designate the art of statuary, properly signifies to form or shape a thing of clay. The second material was wood , and figures made of wood were called ξόανα , from ξέω , “polish” or “carve.” It was chiefly used for making images of the gods, and probably more on account of the facility of working in it, than for any other reason. Stone was little used in statuary during the early ages of Greece, though it was not altogether unknown, as we may infer from the relief on the Lion-gate of Mycenae. In Italy, where the soft peperino afforded an easy material for working, stone appears to have been used at an earlier period and more commonly than in Greece. But in the historical times the Greeks used all the principal varieties of marble for their statues. Different kinds of marble and of different colours were sometimes used in one and the same statue, in which case the work is called Poly lithic statuary. Bronze ( χάλκος , aes ), silver , and gold were used profusely in the state of society described in the Homeric poems. At that period, however, and long after, the works executed in metal were made by means of the hammer, and the different pieces were joined together by pins, rivets, cramps, or other mechanical fastenings, and, as the art advanced, by a kind of glue, cement, or solder. Iron came into use much later, and the art of casting both bronze and iron is ascribed to Rhoecus and to The odor as of Samos. Ivory was employed at a later period than any of the before-mentioned materials, and then was highly valued both for its beauty and rarity. In its application to statuary, ivory was generally combined with gold, and was used for the parts representing the flesh. The history of ancient art, and of statuary in particular, may be divided into five periods. I. First Period, from the earliest times till about 580 B.C. —Three kinds of artists may be distinguished in the mythical period. The first consists of gods and daemons; such as Athena, Hephaestus, the Phrygian or Dardanian Dactyli, and the Cabiri. The second contains whole tribes of men distinguished from others by the mysterious po e ion of superior skill in the practice of the arts, such as the Tel chines and the Cyclopes. The third consists of individuals who are indeed described as human beings, but yet are nothing more than personifications of particular branches of art, or the representatives of families of artists. Of the latter the most celebrated is Daedal us , whose name indicates nothing but a smith, or an artist in general, and who is himself the mythical ancestor of a numerous family of artists ( Daedal ids ), which can be traced from the time of Homer to that of Plato, for even So crates is said to have been a descendant of this family. Smilis (from σμίλη , a carving-knife) exercised his art in Samos, Aegina, and other places, and some remarkable works were attributed to him. Endoeus of Athens is called a disciple of Daedal us. According to the popular traditions of Greece, there was no period in which the gods were not represented in some form or other, and there is no doubt that for a long time there existed no other statues in Greece than those of the gods. The earliest representations of the gods, however, were only symbolic. The presence of a god was indicated by the simplest and most shapele symbols, such as unhewn blocks of stone ( λίθοι ἀργοί ), and by simple pillars or pieces of wood. The general name for a representation of a god not consisting of such a rude symbol was ἄγαλμα . In the Homeric poems there are sufficient traces of the existence of statues of the gods; but they probably did not display any artistic beauty. The only work of art which has come down to us from the heroic age is the relief above the ancient gate of Mycenae, representing two lions standing on their hind legs, with a sort of pillar between them (woodcut under Murus ). The time which elapsed between the composition of the Homeric poems and the beginning of the fifth century before our aera may be termed the age of discovery; for nearly all the inventions, upon the application of which the development of the arts is dependent, are a igned to this period. Glaucus of Chios or Samos is said to have invented the art of soldering metal ( σιδήρου κόλλησις ). The two artists most celebrated for their discoveries were the two brothers Telecles and The odor as of Samos, about the time of Poly crates. They invented the art of casting figures of metal. During the whole of this period, though marble and bronze began to be extensively applied, yet wood was more generally used for representations of the gods. These statues were painted [ Pictura ], and in most cases dre ed in the most gorgeous attire. The style in which they are executed is called the archaic or the hieratic style. The figures are stiff and clumsy, the countenances have little or no individuality, the eyes long and small, and the outer angles turned a little upwards; the mouth, which is likewise drawn upwards at the two corners, has a smiling appearance. The hair is carefully worked, but looks stiff and wiry, and hangs generally down in straight lines, which are curled at the ends. The arms hang down the sides of the body, unle the figure carries something in its hands. The drapery is likewise stiff, and the folds are very symmetrical and worked with little regard to nature. II. Second Period, from 580 to 480 B.C. —The number of artists who flourished during this period is truly astonishing. The Ionians of Asia Minor and the islanders of the Aegean, who had previously been in advance of the other Greeks in the exercise of the fine arts, had their last flourishing period from 560 to 528 B.C. Works in metal were produced in high perfection in Samos, in Aegina and Argos, while Chios gained the greatest reputation from its po e ing the earliest great school of sculptors in marble, in which Bupalus and An therm us were the most distinguished about 540 B.C. Their works were scattered over various parts of Greece, and their value may be inferred from the fact that August us adorned with them the pediment of the temple of Apollo on the Palatine. Sicyon also po e ed a celebrated school of sculptors in marble, and about 580 B.C. Dipoenus and Scyllis, who had come from Crete, were at the head of it, and executed several marble statues of gods. Respecting Magna Graecia and Sicily we know few particulars, though it appears that the arts here went on improving and continued to be in advance of the mother-country. The most celebrated artists in southern Italy were Dameas of Croton, and Pythagoras of Rhegium. In Athens the arts made great progre under the patronage of the Pis is trat ids. The most celebrated among the A then i an sculptors of this period were Critias and Hegias, or Hegesias, both distinguished for their works in bronze. The former of them made in 477 B.C. the statues of Harmodius and Aristo git on. Argos also distinguished itself, and it is a curious circumstance, that the greatest Attic artists with whom the third period opens, and who brought the Attic art to its culminating point, are disciples of the Argive A geladas (about 516 B.C. ) In the statues of the gods ( ἀγάλματα ), which were made for temples as objects of worship, the hieratic style was more or le conscientiously retained, and it is therefore not in these statues that we have to seek for proofs of the progre of art. But even in temple-statues wood began to give way to other and better materials. Besides bronze, marble also, and ivory and gold were now applied to statues of the gods, and it was not uncommon to form the body of a statue of wood, and to make its head, arms, and feet of stone ( ἀκρόλιθοι ), or to cover the whole of such a wooden figure with ivory and gold. From the statues of the gods erected for worship we must distinguish those statues which were dedicated in temples as ἀναθήματα , and which now became customary instead of craters, tripods, . In these the artists were not only not bound to any traditional or conventional forms, but were, like the poets, allowed to make free use of mythological subjects, to add, and to omit, or to modify the stories, so as to render them more adapted for their artistic purposes. A third cla of statues, which were erected during this period in great numbers, were those of the victors in the national games, and, though more rarely, of other distinguished persons ( ἀνδριάντες ). Those of the latter kind appear generally to have been portraits ( εἰκόνες , statuae iconicae ). The first iconic statues of Harmodius and Aristo git on were made by Antenor in 509 B.C. , and in 477 B.C. new statues of the same persons were made by Critias . It was also at the period we are now describing that it became customary to adorn the pediments, friezes, and other parts of temples with reliefs or groups of statues of marble. We still po e two great works of this kind which are sufficient to show their general character during this period. 1. The Selinuntine Marbles , or the metopes of two temples on the acropolis of Selinus in Sicily, which were discovered in 1823, and are at present in the Museum of Palermo. 2. The Aeginetan Marbles , which were discovered in 1812 in the island of Aegina, and are now at Munich. They consist of eleven statues, which adorned two pediments of a temple of Athena, and represent the godde leading the Aeacids against Troy, and contain manifest allusions to the war of the Greeks with the Persians.