DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.9177#0266
246
PRINCIPLES OF GREEK ART
CHAP.
ber. It is natural that the choice of the artist between the
two kinds should have been largely determined by the nature
of his field: in a square field only a few figures could be intro-
duced, in a long narrow space more would be necessary. But
besides the external compulsion thus exercised, an artist of
greater powers and more inventiveness would naturally take a
more complicated subject.
It is characteristic of the vase-painter of the sixth century
and earlier that, just as he objects to leaving any part of his
vase without decoration, so he will tell in his design as much
of the story as he can. In doing this he disregards the unities
of time and place in the most reckless manner. He "sows not
with the hand, but with the basket." Herein, indeed, he only
follows the course which is most natural and usual in the early
ages of art, and which is as conspicuous in the work of the
sculptors of Gothic cathedrals and the illuminations of early
manuscripts as it is in primitive Hellas.
We will give one or two simple examples, which may be
taken indiscriminately from early vases or early bronze reliefs,
since the principles of arrangement are much the same in both
kinds of ware. On a black-figured plate at Athens there
is represented the arming of Achilles (Fig. 83)-1 Before him
stands his mother Thetis, while the group is flanked on one
side by his father Peleus, on the other by his young son Neop-
tolemus. The painter, by carefully adding the names, has
tried to prevent all possible misinterpretation. The group he
has put together is not a possible one, since Achilles' fighting
life was spent entirely in Asia, while Peleus never left Phthia,
and Neoptolemus did not go to Ilium until after his father's
death. But it expresses relations; it is a family group if not a
historic one. Similarly, when Theseus slays the Minotaur on
early vases,2 some of the Athenian boys and girls sent to be the
1 Heydemann, Griech. Vasenbilder, PI. VI., 4.
2 Baumeistcr, Denkmaler, p. 1790.
PRINCIPLES OF GREEK ART
CHAP.
ber. It is natural that the choice of the artist between the
two kinds should have been largely determined by the nature
of his field: in a square field only a few figures could be intro-
duced, in a long narrow space more would be necessary. But
besides the external compulsion thus exercised, an artist of
greater powers and more inventiveness would naturally take a
more complicated subject.
It is characteristic of the vase-painter of the sixth century
and earlier that, just as he objects to leaving any part of his
vase without decoration, so he will tell in his design as much
of the story as he can. In doing this he disregards the unities
of time and place in the most reckless manner. He "sows not
with the hand, but with the basket." Herein, indeed, he only
follows the course which is most natural and usual in the early
ages of art, and which is as conspicuous in the work of the
sculptors of Gothic cathedrals and the illuminations of early
manuscripts as it is in primitive Hellas.
We will give one or two simple examples, which may be
taken indiscriminately from early vases or early bronze reliefs,
since the principles of arrangement are much the same in both
kinds of ware. On a black-figured plate at Athens there
is represented the arming of Achilles (Fig. 83)-1 Before him
stands his mother Thetis, while the group is flanked on one
side by his father Peleus, on the other by his young son Neop-
tolemus. The painter, by carefully adding the names, has
tried to prevent all possible misinterpretation. The group he
has put together is not a possible one, since Achilles' fighting
life was spent entirely in Asia, while Peleus never left Phthia,
and Neoptolemus did not go to Ilium until after his father's
death. But it expresses relations; it is a family group if not a
historic one. Similarly, when Theseus slays the Minotaur on
early vases,2 some of the Athenian boys and girls sent to be the
1 Heydemann, Griech. Vasenbilder, PI. VI., 4.
2 Baumeistcr, Denkmaler, p. 1790.