DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61301#0092
66
STUDIES IN GREEK ART.
Chaldaean empire show a rough, vivid, naturalism very
different from the finished work before us. Later than
the date of Assurnazirpal, in the reign of Assurbani-
pal, 668-626 B.C., art attained a greater luxuriance ;
there is less convention in the treatment of floral form
and animal life; the favourite lion specially is drawn
with the most startling fidelity. Our specimen of work
stands midway, when art had attained a certain per-
fection, and seemed for awhile to crystallize.
The devices of our robe are exhausted, but we have
not done \vith the robe itself; it suggests to us another
and a most important thought. The Greeks noted with
surprise that the barbarians thought it a shame to be
seen unclothed ; their own climate was temperate and
equable, and they delighted, as we shall see, in the study
and development of the human figure. In striking
contrast the Assyrians are a nation of clothes. Their
climate, fickle and often inclement as it is, with sudden
changes from fierce heat by day to frost by night, com-
pels ample covering. We have seen the tiny figures on
our plate with their close, formal drapery, thick and un-
compromising, standing out in its own stiffness, not
pliant to the motions and postures of the body. Never
having before him the undraped model, the artist never
attained any real, searching knowledge of the structure
of the human body, and therefore never knew its
capacities for variety and beauty of form. He is con-
STUDIES IN GREEK ART.
Chaldaean empire show a rough, vivid, naturalism very
different from the finished work before us. Later than
the date of Assurnazirpal, in the reign of Assurbani-
pal, 668-626 B.C., art attained a greater luxuriance ;
there is less convention in the treatment of floral form
and animal life; the favourite lion specially is drawn
with the most startling fidelity. Our specimen of work
stands midway, when art had attained a certain per-
fection, and seemed for awhile to crystallize.
The devices of our robe are exhausted, but we have
not done \vith the robe itself; it suggests to us another
and a most important thought. The Greeks noted with
surprise that the barbarians thought it a shame to be
seen unclothed ; their own climate was temperate and
equable, and they delighted, as we shall see, in the study
and development of the human figure. In striking
contrast the Assyrians are a nation of clothes. Their
climate, fickle and often inclement as it is, with sudden
changes from fierce heat by day to frost by night, com-
pels ample covering. We have seen the tiny figures on
our plate with their close, formal drapery, thick and un-
compromising, standing out in its own stiffness, not
pliant to the motions and postures of the body. Never
having before him the undraped model, the artist never
attained any real, searching knowledge of the structure
of the human body, and therefore never knew its
capacities for variety and beauty of form. He is con-