DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18218#0266
252
CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE.
and Kco/xwSta does not prove a late date, since the omission
of the iota, though rare before the time of the empire, can
be shown to have occurred occasionally, at least as early
as the second century B.C. (cf. Loewy, p. 209 ; Eeinach,
L'Epigraphie Grecque, p. 270; and the inscription from
Priene, Greek Inscriptions in Brit. Mus., No. ccccxxn.).
The sentiment of the design is also well suited to
the taste of the Alexandrine age, when allegorical
personifications began to take the place of simpler
mythological figures. Such personifications would, no
doubt, be recognised more frequently in ancient art, if
we had the means of identifying them. The celebrated
picture of Slander by Apelles (about 330 B.C.) is said to
have contained figures of Ignorance, Suspicion, Envy,
Malice, Deceit, Truth, Eepentance. In the procession of
Ptolemy II. (about 260 B.C.) a figure of Ptolemy was
accompanied by a figure of Arete (Virtue) holding out an
olive wreath (Athen., v., p. 201 n).
Ptolemy Philopator built a temple of Homer, which
contained a statue of the poet surrounded by personi-
fications of the cities that claimed to be his birthplace
(Aelian, Var. Hist., xiii. 22).
The style of the sculpture presents nothing dis-
tinctively characteristic of the Eoman period, or at
variance with Hellenistic art. Little invention, however,
is shown in the figures, several of which represent well-
known types, the authorship of which has lately been
assigned (by Watzinger, after Amelung) to Philiscus of
Rhodes. The relief also is unusually couqflicated. The
figures range from a low to a very high degree of projec-
tion, and the planes of the background are remarkably
varied. So picturesque a treatment would not have been
admitted in Greek art till that later period when sculpture
came under the influence of painting and attempted to
express in marble scenes more suitable to the sister art.
CATALOGUE OF SCULPTURE.
and Kco/xwSta does not prove a late date, since the omission
of the iota, though rare before the time of the empire, can
be shown to have occurred occasionally, at least as early
as the second century B.C. (cf. Loewy, p. 209 ; Eeinach,
L'Epigraphie Grecque, p. 270; and the inscription from
Priene, Greek Inscriptions in Brit. Mus., No. ccccxxn.).
The sentiment of the design is also well suited to
the taste of the Alexandrine age, when allegorical
personifications began to take the place of simpler
mythological figures. Such personifications would, no
doubt, be recognised more frequently in ancient art, if
we had the means of identifying them. The celebrated
picture of Slander by Apelles (about 330 B.C.) is said to
have contained figures of Ignorance, Suspicion, Envy,
Malice, Deceit, Truth, Eepentance. In the procession of
Ptolemy II. (about 260 B.C.) a figure of Ptolemy was
accompanied by a figure of Arete (Virtue) holding out an
olive wreath (Athen., v., p. 201 n).
Ptolemy Philopator built a temple of Homer, which
contained a statue of the poet surrounded by personi-
fications of the cities that claimed to be his birthplace
(Aelian, Var. Hist., xiii. 22).
The style of the sculpture presents nothing dis-
tinctively characteristic of the Eoman period, or at
variance with Hellenistic art. Little invention, however,
is shown in the figures, several of which represent well-
known types, the authorship of which has lately been
assigned (by Watzinger, after Amelung) to Philiscus of
Rhodes. The relief also is unusually couqflicated. The
figures range from a low to a very high degree of projec-
tion, and the planes of the background are remarkably
varied. So picturesque a treatment would not have been
admitted in Greek art till that later period when sculpture
came under the influence of painting and attempted to
express in marble scenes more suitable to the sister art.