THE GAUL KILLING HIS WIFE. 561

some miserable restorer, who has ' worked over' and partially destroyed
the front surface of the female figure. This group represents another
of the thousand stirring and affecting scenes of the battle-field, in
which a Gaul, in the face of the nearly approaching enemy, has just
slain his wife, and with upraised hand is driving the deadly steel
into his own throat.

Very striking and touching is the contrast between the powerful
vigorous warrior standing at bay before the foe, with his dark defiant
scowl, and the lifeless form and

Fig. 236

piteous face of the poor wife, whom
he has so ruthlessly sacrificed to
pride and honour.

The masterly freedom of ex-
ecution shown in these kindred
figures, and the entire absence of
the unmeaning smoothness and
petty accuracy in detail which
betray the copyist, would incline
us to regard them as original
works of the Pergamenian artists
mentioned by Pliny; but unfor-
tunately lie speaks of them only
as workers in bronze. There is,
however, great reason for be-
lieving that they are the work
°f Pergamenian artists employed
to immortalise the victories of

Attalus. Cognate in character and style, though probably executed
W Rome, is the very beautiful statue generally called ' Thusnelda,'
Dut more correctly ' Germania devietal in the Loggia de' Lanzi at
Florence, to whom the wife in the Ludovisi group bears a very
•striking resemblance in the face.

'The Knife sharpener, in the Tribune at Florence, has been claimed
for the school of Per^ainon,1 and Certainly stands in very near rela-

THB GAUL KILLING HIS WIFE.

1 liursian, Allg

Sect. i. IS. S2, p. 4S2.