DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.69192#0119
[ 55 ]
With elephants, lions, or tygers, and other Indian
Wild beasts.
Bacchus, however, is always represented by the
best artists, with a face as young as, and per-
haps more beautiful and effeminate than, ever
man had. The poets agree with the artists, and
speak as expressly of his eternal youth as of
Apollo’s, to whom he was reckoned equal (or at
lead next) for his beauty, and for the length and
ssow of his hair b.
b Ovid. Fast. iii. v. 744. Tib. i. el. 4. v. 37. Met. iii.
v. 607. ib. iv. v. 20. The heads of Apollo and Bacchus were
so like, they could hardly be known from one another, without
some other attribute ; only in their best figures Apollo’s face is
the more majestic, and Bacchus’s the more charming, Tib. i. el.
4, v. 38. Met. iii. v. 421. Mart. iv. ep. 45. v. 8. Virgil (Geo.
ii. v. 392.) speaks of little heads of Bacchus hung up by the coun-
trymen on trees, from a notion that his regard gave fertility to the
grounds. This obscure passage is clearly explained by a gem at
Florence, on which there are heads on a tree looking every way.
Pl. 2. n. 5. The poets generally attribute horns to Bacchus
(to fliew he was the son of Jupiter Ammon) which are seldom
seen in his statues. This, our author thinks, was owing to the
ignorance of the antiquaries abroad, who, seeing the horns, take
it for a faun, and then add some attribute of a faun to the figure.
Their smallness too makes them liable to be hid by the crown of
'grapes or ivy. Be this as it will, it is strange this attribute should
be so frequent in the poets, and so uncommon in statues, Ovid.
Fast. iii.v. 790. Her. ep. xv. v. 24. Ovid. Art. Am. i. v. 232.
ib. iii. v. 34S. Stat, Theb. ix. v. 436. Flac. ii. v. 272. Stat.
Theb. vii. v.151. Sometimes the horns were gilded, Hor. ii.
od. 19. v. 30. Stat. iii. Sylv. iii. v. 62. Ariadne fell in love with
him fop his horns, Fast. iii. v. 500. From these horns Bacchus
was called Bicemifcr. Ovid. Her. ep. 13. v. 33.
8
The
With elephants, lions, or tygers, and other Indian
Wild beasts.
Bacchus, however, is always represented by the
best artists, with a face as young as, and per-
haps more beautiful and effeminate than, ever
man had. The poets agree with the artists, and
speak as expressly of his eternal youth as of
Apollo’s, to whom he was reckoned equal (or at
lead next) for his beauty, and for the length and
ssow of his hair b.
b Ovid. Fast. iii. v. 744. Tib. i. el. 4. v. 37. Met. iii.
v. 607. ib. iv. v. 20. The heads of Apollo and Bacchus were
so like, they could hardly be known from one another, without
some other attribute ; only in their best figures Apollo’s face is
the more majestic, and Bacchus’s the more charming, Tib. i. el.
4, v. 38. Met. iii. v. 421. Mart. iv. ep. 45. v. 8. Virgil (Geo.
ii. v. 392.) speaks of little heads of Bacchus hung up by the coun-
trymen on trees, from a notion that his regard gave fertility to the
grounds. This obscure passage is clearly explained by a gem at
Florence, on which there are heads on a tree looking every way.
Pl. 2. n. 5. The poets generally attribute horns to Bacchus
(to fliew he was the son of Jupiter Ammon) which are seldom
seen in his statues. This, our author thinks, was owing to the
ignorance of the antiquaries abroad, who, seeing the horns, take
it for a faun, and then add some attribute of a faun to the figure.
Their smallness too makes them liable to be hid by the crown of
'grapes or ivy. Be this as it will, it is strange this attribute should
be so frequent in the poets, and so uncommon in statues, Ovid.
Fast. iii.v. 790. Her. ep. xv. v. 24. Ovid. Art. Am. i. v. 232.
ib. iii. v. 34S. Stat, Theb. ix. v. 436. Flac. ii. v. 272. Stat.
Theb. vii. v.151. Sometimes the horns were gilded, Hor. ii.
od. 19. v. 30. Stat. iii. Sylv. iii. v. 62. Ariadne fell in love with
him fop his horns, Fast. iii. v. 500. From these horns Bacchus
was called Bicemifcr. Ovid. Her. ep. 13. v. 33.
8
The