DOI article:
Essay I: The provice, aim, and methos of the stuy of classical archaeology
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.11444#0037
THE STUDY OF CLASSICAL ARCHAEOLOGY.
17
drives man's senses and thought out into the outer world ; the
colder drives them within and makes him primarily self-centred
so that he views the things without in their bearing upon the
subject within.
The same holds good with regard to the constitution of the
soil. Midway between luxurious vegetation which demands no
exertion to yield its fruit, and the relentless sterility which
makes work the mainspring of man's life, the Greek soil roused
its inhabitants to exertion of energy, yet permitted of their
seeing in nature a kind and beautiful mother. Both climate and
soil favoured, what may be expressed in the one short word,
play. While neither the East nor the South provided their
inhabitants with sufficient energy for sportiveness (which always
demands some surplus of vital spirits), the northern climes har-
dened energy into the sternness and earnestness of labour. It
was this physical constitution of the surroundings of the Greeks
which led them to their early and most characteristic institution,
the athletic games. And this institution again, coupled with their
primary predisposition to observation, fostered and developed
their appreciation of the human form, thus becoming one of the
chief promoters of the plastic spirit in its higher stages.
With regard to the physical causes which in the most ele-
mentary way furthered the observing and plastic power of the
Greeks, we must also bear in mind the physical geography of
Greece. Here again we are midway between the flat expanse
of endless plains which do not impress the eyes of the inhabi-
tants either with succinctness of form or with variety, and the
awful ruggedness of alpine districts which oppress man and his
fancy with their stern majesty, and restrict his horizon. Plains
and valleys, free and wide, open to the eye, moulded and varied
into individual form by clear-cut hills, loosen as it were the
fetters of fancy, but limit its sphere by the bounds of modera-
tion and harmony. So also the sea, which appeals so strongly
to imagination and enterprise, did not wash a fiat shore with its
endless procession of waves, suggesting the infinite and vague,
but was fettered into form in the numerous inlets, gulfs, and
bays, clasped and held as it were by the firm land. Thus the
natural surroundings favoured in every way the free and full
development of the powers of observation of the Greeks.
W. 2.
17
drives man's senses and thought out into the outer world ; the
colder drives them within and makes him primarily self-centred
so that he views the things without in their bearing upon the
subject within.
The same holds good with regard to the constitution of the
soil. Midway between luxurious vegetation which demands no
exertion to yield its fruit, and the relentless sterility which
makes work the mainspring of man's life, the Greek soil roused
its inhabitants to exertion of energy, yet permitted of their
seeing in nature a kind and beautiful mother. Both climate and
soil favoured, what may be expressed in the one short word,
play. While neither the East nor the South provided their
inhabitants with sufficient energy for sportiveness (which always
demands some surplus of vital spirits), the northern climes har-
dened energy into the sternness and earnestness of labour. It
was this physical constitution of the surroundings of the Greeks
which led them to their early and most characteristic institution,
the athletic games. And this institution again, coupled with their
primary predisposition to observation, fostered and developed
their appreciation of the human form, thus becoming one of the
chief promoters of the plastic spirit in its higher stages.
With regard to the physical causes which in the most ele-
mentary way furthered the observing and plastic power of the
Greeks, we must also bear in mind the physical geography of
Greece. Here again we are midway between the flat expanse
of endless plains which do not impress the eyes of the inhabi-
tants either with succinctness of form or with variety, and the
awful ruggedness of alpine districts which oppress man and his
fancy with their stern majesty, and restrict his horizon. Plains
and valleys, free and wide, open to the eye, moulded and varied
into individual form by clear-cut hills, loosen as it were the
fetters of fancy, but limit its sphere by the bounds of modera-
tion and harmony. So also the sea, which appeals so strongly
to imagination and enterprise, did not wash a fiat shore with its
endless procession of waves, suggesting the infinite and vague,
but was fettered into form in the numerous inlets, gulfs, and
bays, clasped and held as it were by the firm land. Thus the
natural surroundings favoured in every way the free and full
development of the powers of observation of the Greeks.
W. 2.