Group of the Laocoon. CHAPTER XLVII. HISTORY OF GRECIAN ART FROM THE END OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WAR TO ITS DECLINE. § 1. Later school of Athenian sculpture. § 2. Scopas. §3. Praxiteles. §4. Sicyonian school of sculpture. Euphranor, Lysippus. § 5. Sicyonian school of painting. Eupompus, Phamphilus, Apelles. § 6. Architecture. § 7. Period after Alexander the Great. School of Rhodes. § 8. Plunder of Greek works of art by the Romans. § 1. AFTER the close of the Peloponnesian war, what is called the second or later school of Attic sculpture still continued to assert its pre-eminence. In style and character, however, it presented a marked difference from the school of the preceding age. The excitement and misfortunes which had attended the war had worked a great change in the Athenians. This was communicated to their works of art, which now manifested an expression of stronger passion and of deeper feeling. The serene and composed majesty which had marked the gods and heroes of the earlier artists altogether vanished. The new school of sculptures preferred to take other deities for their subjects than those which had been selected by their predecessors; and Jove, Hera, and Athena gave place to gods, characterized by more violent feelings and passions, such as Dionysus, Aphrodité, and Eros. These formed the favorite subjects of the later Athenian school, and received from it that stamp and character of representation which they retained through the succeeding period of classic art. A change is also observable in the materials employed, and in the technical handling of them. The magnificently adorned chryso-elephantine statues almost wholly disappear; marble becomes more frequently used, especially by the Athenian statuaries, and the whole execution is softer and more flowing. B.C. § 2. The only two artists of this school whom it will be necessary to mention are Scopas and Praxiteles. Scopas was a native of Paros, and flourished in the first half of the fourth century His exact date can not be ascertained, nor is there anything known of his life, except in connexion with his works, of which some specimens still remain. Among these are the basreliefs on the frieze of the perystyle which surrounded the Mausoleum, or tomb of Mausolus, at Halicarnassus (Budrum), some of which are now deposited in the British Museum (Budrum Marbles). Their style is very similar to that of the sculptures on the frieze of the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates, which is of the same period of art.* Both are of high excellence, but inferior to the frieze of the Parthenon. Scopas, however, was more famous for single statues and detached groups than for architectural sculpture. His statues of Aphrodité were very celebrated in antiquity. That of the victorious Aphrodité (Venus victrix) in the Louvre at Paris is ascribed to his chisel by many competent judges. But the most esteemed of all his works was a group representing Achilles conducted by the marine deities to the island of Leucé. It consisted of figures of Poseidon, Thetis, and Achilles, surrounded by Nereids on dolphins, huge fishes and hippocampi, and attended by Tritons and sea-monsters. In the treatment of the subject heroic grandeur is said to have been combined with grace. A group better known in modern times, from a copy of it preserved in the Museum at Florence, is that of Niobé and her children slain by the hands of Artemis and Apollo. There can be no doubt that it filled the pediment of a temple. At a later period it was preserved in the temple of Apollo Sosianus at Rome, but it was a disputed point among the Romans whether it was from the hands of Scopas or Praxiteles. In the noble forms of the countenances grief and despair are protrayed without distortion. Another celebrated work of Scopas was the statue of the Pythian Apollo playing on the lyre, which See drawing on p. 552. * See below, p. 584. Augustus placed in the temple which he built to Apollo on the Palatine, in thanksgiving for his victory at Actium. The copy of this statue in the Vatican is figured on p. 551. Scopas was an architect as well as a statuary, and built the temple of Athena Alea at Tagea, in Arcadia, one of the largest and most magnificent in the Peloponnesus. §3. Praxiteles was contemporary with Scopas, though perhaps somewhat younger. Nothing is positively known of his history, except that he was at least a citizen, if not a native, of Athens, and that his career as an artist was intimately connected with that city. He excelled in representing the softer beauties of the human form, and especially the female figure. But art had now sunk from its lofty and ideal majesty. The Cnidian Aphrodité, the master-piece of Praxiteles, expressed only sensual charms, and was avowedly modelled from the courtesan Phryné. Yet such was its excellence that many made a voyage to Cnidus on purpose to behold it; and so highly did the Cnidians prize it, that they refused to part with it to king Nicomedes, although he offered to pay off their public debt in exchange for it. In this work Aphrodité was represented either as just entering or just quitting the bath; and it is said to have been the first instance in which any artist had ventured to represent the goddess entirely divested of drapery. At the same time he made a draped statue of the goddess for the Coans, which however never enjoyed so much reputation as the former, though Praxiteles obtained the same price for it. He also made two statues of Eros, one of which he deemed his masterpiece. It is related that in his fondness for Phryné he promised to give her any statue she might choose, but was unwilling to tell her which he considered his masterpiece. In order to ascertain this point Phryné sent a message to Praxiteles that his house was on fire; at which news he rushed out exclaiming that he was undone if the fire had touched his Satyr or his Eros. He also excelled in representing Dionysus with his fauns and satyrs. A statue of Apollo, known as Apollo Sauroctonos, or the lizard-killer, was among his most famous pieces. It was in bronze, and numerous copies of it are still extant. § 4. The later Athenian school of sculpture was succeeded by the Sicyonian school. It is characterised by representations of heroic strength and of the form of athlete, and by a striving after the colossal. Its chief artists were Euphranor and Lysippus. Euphranor was a native of the Corinthian isthmus, but practised his art at Athens. He appears to have flourished during the time of Philip of Macedon, and beyond the period of Alexander's accession. He excelled in painting as well as in statuary. He executed figures in bronze and marble of all sizes, from a drinking-cup to a colossal statue. One of his most celebrated works was a statue of Paris. Lysippus was a native of Sicyon, and flourished during the reign of Alexander the Great. He was originally a mere workman in bronze, but through his genius and a sedulous study of nature rose to the highest eminence as a statuary. He followed the school of Polyclétus, whose Doryphorus formed his standard model; but by this course of study the ideal of art was sacrificed to the merely natural. Hercules, a human hero, was the favourite snbject of his chisel; but he deviated from former models, in which Hercules was endowed with ponderous strength, and represented him as characterised by strength and agility combined. This type was adopted by subsequent artists. The celebrated Farnese Hercules in the Museum at Naples is probably a copy of one of his works. Lysippus excelled in portraits; in which department he also adhered to his principles of art, and followed nature so closely as to portray even the defects of his subjects. Thus, in his busts of Alexander, he did not omit his wry neck. Nevertheless, that monarch was so pleased with his performances, that he forbade anybody but Lysippus and Apelles to represent him. The most renowned of Lysippus's statues of Alexander was that which represented him brandishing a lance, and which was regarded as a companion to the picture of Apelles, in which he wielded a thunderbolt. It has been observed that the features of Alexander pervade most of the heroic statues of this period. Lysippus worked principally in bronze. One of his most celebrated productions was an equestrian group of the chieftains who fell at the battle of the Granicus. His works were very numerous, and are said to have amounted to 1500. § 5. With regard to painting, the Asiatic school of Zeuxis and Parrhasius was also succeeded by a Sicyonian school, of which Eupompus may be considered as the founder. He was excelled, however, by his pupil Pamphilus, who was renowned as a teacher of his art, and founded a sort of academy. His period of instruction extended over ten years, and his fee was a talent. The school of Pamphilus produced several celebrated artists, of whom Apelles was by far the greatest. Apelles seems to have been a native of Colophon, in Ionia; but, as we have said, he studied ten years under Pamphilus at Amphipolis; and subsequently, even after he had attained some reputation, under Melanthius at Sicyon. Thus to the grace and elegance of the Ionic school he added the scientific accuracy of the Sicyonian. The greater part of his life seems to have been spent at the court of Pella. He was warmly patronised by Alexander, who frequently visited his studio, and, as mentioned before, granted him the exclusive privilege of painting his portrait. In one of these visits Alexander began to descant on art, but exposed his ignorance so much that Apelles gave him a polite hint to be silent, as the boys who were grinding the colours were laughing at him. He appears to have accompanied Alexander in his eastern expedition, and after the death of that monarch to have travelled through the western parts of Asia. He spent the latter part of his life at the court of king Ptolemy in Egypt. The character of Apelles presents us with traits quite the reverse of the silly vanity of Zeuxis. He was always ready to acknowledge his own faults, as well as the merits of others. In fact, there was only one point in which he asserted his superiority over his contemporaries, namely, grace; and there can be no doubt that this was no vain assumption. He was not ashamed to learn from the humblest critics. With this view he was accustomed to exhibit his unfinished pictures before his house, and to conceal himself behind them in order to hear the criticisms of the passers by. On one of these occasions a cobbler detected a fault in the shoes of one of his figures, which Apelles corrected. The next time he passed, the cobbler, encouraged by the success of his criticism, began to remark upon the leg; at which the artist lost all patience, and rushing from behind his picture, commanded the cobbler to keep to his shoes. Hence the proverb, "Ne sutor ultra crepidam,"-let the cobbler stick to his last. His conduct towards his contemporary Protogenes of Rhodes exhibits a generosity not always found among rival artists. On arriving at Rhodes, Apelles saw that the works of Protogenes were scarcely at all valued by his countrymen; whereupon he offered him fifty talents for one of his pictures, at the same time spreading the report that he meant to sell it again as one of his own. Apelles studied with the greatest industry, and always went on trying to improve himself; yet he knew when to leave off correcting his pictures, and laid it down as a maxim that over care often spoiled a piece. His pictures seem to have been chiefly on moveable panels, and he was probably the first who used a sort of varnish to his pictures with an effect somewhat similar to that of the modern toning or glazing. He generally painted single figures, or groups of only a few. He excelled in portraits, among the most celebrated of which was that already mentioned of Alexander wielding the thunderbolt. The hand which held it seemed to stand out of the panel; and, in order to heighten this effect of foreshortening, Alexander's complexion was made dark, though in reality it was light. The |