DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.57409#0028
12
INTRODUCTION TO THE LIVES.
of sculpture is thus affirmed to have come from him. But
according .to Pliny, this art was carried into Egypt by the
Lydian Gyges, who, standing near a fire, and observing his
own shadow, instantly sketched himself on the wall with
a piece of charcoal ; and from that time, it was customary,
as Pliny further says, to draw in outline only without colour,
a method afterwards re-discovered, by less simple means, by
Philocles, the Egyptian, as also by Cleanthes and Ardices of
Corinth, and by Telephanes of Sicyon.
The Corinthian Cleophantes was the first among the
Greeks who used colours, and Apollodorus was the first who
handled the pencil ; they were followed by Polygnotus of
Thasos, by Zeuxis and Timagoras of Chaicis, with Pythias
and Aglaophon, all widely renowned.* After these masters
came the far-famed Apelles, so highly esteemed for his
talents, as Lucian informs us, by Alexander the Great (that
acute discriminator of worth and pretension), and so richly
endowed by Heaven,—as almost all the best sculptors and
painters ever have been. For not only have they been
poets also, as we read of Pacuvius, but philosophers like-
wise, as in the case of Metrodorus, who, profound in philo-
sophy as skilful in painting, and being deputed by the
Athenians to Rome to adorn the triumph of Paulus Emliius,
was retained by that commander to instruct his sons in
philosophy.
We find, then, that the art of sculpture was zealously cul-
tivated by the Greeks, among whom many excellent artists
appeared ; those great masters, the Athenian Phidias, with
Praxiteles and Polycletus, were of the number, while Ly-
sippus and Pyrgoteles, worked successfully in intaglio, and
Pygmalionf produced admirable reliefs in itory—nay, of him
it was affirmed, that his prayers obtained life and soul for
the statue of a virgin which he had formed. Painting was
in like manner honoured, and those who practised it success-
fully were rewarded among the ancient Greeks and Romans;
this is proved by their according the rights of citizenship, and
the most exalted dignities, to such as attained high distinc-
tion in these arts, both of which flourished so greatly in
* There was no celebrated painter of the name of Pythia Pausi 's
or Nicias may be meant.
f Fabulous.
INTRODUCTION TO THE LIVES.
of sculpture is thus affirmed to have come from him. But
according .to Pliny, this art was carried into Egypt by the
Lydian Gyges, who, standing near a fire, and observing his
own shadow, instantly sketched himself on the wall with
a piece of charcoal ; and from that time, it was customary,
as Pliny further says, to draw in outline only without colour,
a method afterwards re-discovered, by less simple means, by
Philocles, the Egyptian, as also by Cleanthes and Ardices of
Corinth, and by Telephanes of Sicyon.
The Corinthian Cleophantes was the first among the
Greeks who used colours, and Apollodorus was the first who
handled the pencil ; they were followed by Polygnotus of
Thasos, by Zeuxis and Timagoras of Chaicis, with Pythias
and Aglaophon, all widely renowned.* After these masters
came the far-famed Apelles, so highly esteemed for his
talents, as Lucian informs us, by Alexander the Great (that
acute discriminator of worth and pretension), and so richly
endowed by Heaven,—as almost all the best sculptors and
painters ever have been. For not only have they been
poets also, as we read of Pacuvius, but philosophers like-
wise, as in the case of Metrodorus, who, profound in philo-
sophy as skilful in painting, and being deputed by the
Athenians to Rome to adorn the triumph of Paulus Emliius,
was retained by that commander to instruct his sons in
philosophy.
We find, then, that the art of sculpture was zealously cul-
tivated by the Greeks, among whom many excellent artists
appeared ; those great masters, the Athenian Phidias, with
Praxiteles and Polycletus, were of the number, while Ly-
sippus and Pyrgoteles, worked successfully in intaglio, and
Pygmalionf produced admirable reliefs in itory—nay, of him
it was affirmed, that his prayers obtained life and soul for
the statue of a virgin which he had formed. Painting was
in like manner honoured, and those who practised it success-
fully were rewarded among the ancient Greeks and Romans;
this is proved by their according the rights of citizenship, and
the most exalted dignities, to such as attained high distinc-
tion in these arts, both of which flourished so greatly in
* There was no celebrated painter of the name of Pythia Pausi 's
or Nicias may be meant.
f Fabulous.