DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1755#0065
*f i£^J
38 DEDICATION OF STATUES.
flattened externally ; their outline presents equally convex lines on the oppo-
site sides. There is little feeling or attempt at anatomical accuracy to be
perceived in these groups; and the hair is very remarkably expressed: there
is also a curious parallel between these works and the early coins of Mace-
donia. In both the same clumsiness of proportion and breadth of limb are
visible, but more especially on the coins of Lete and Oreskos. The early
coinage of Thasos displays very clumsy figures, which is the more remark-
able, as this city produced Polygnotus, the painter,-—one of the greatest
artists of his age,—at a period not very distant from that to which these coins
belong.
Portraiture, both in painting and sculpture, had already acquired suffi-
cient importance to be deemed an honourable testimony of friendship.
Solon, the relative of Pisistratus, when he visited Croesus, told him that the
Argives had caused statues to be made of the youths Cleobis and Biton, and
had dedicated them to the god at Delphi, in commemoration of their piety.
(Herod, i. 31.) Crcesus himself dedicated to the same divinity a golden statue,
said to be the portrait of his baking woman. Amasis, king of Egypt, sent
to Polycrates two statues of himself carved in wood at Samos, as an assurance
of his friendly disposition ; and to his father-in-law Arcesilaus, king of
Cyrene, he sent his own portrait. .
There is, in the French collection, a remarkable vase painting, which
represents Arcesilaus, king of Cyrene, surrounded by slaves and attendants,
packing silphium,—a celebrated article of commerce in that country. The
king's name is written over his head; and, although this picture cannot have
any value as a likeness, it is important as a production of antiquity. The
first instances of portrait statues being dedicated at the Olympian Games occur
about thirteen years after the accession of Pisistratus, and at the time when
the Persians captured Sardis (Pausanias, vi. 18, 5),'when statues of the
victorious athletee—Praxidamas of /Egina and Ehexibius of Opuntia—were
dedicated in Olympia. The statue of Ilhexibius was made of the wood of the
fig-tree, that of Praxidamas of cypress wood (b. c. 540, Olymp. 59). On the
expulsion of the Pisistratida;, Antiner was employed to make statues of Har-
modius and Aristogiton, which were afterwards carried off by Xerxes to Susa,
but restored by Alexander of Macedonia.
Pliny speaks of Cimon of Cleon®, who invented foreshortening, and who
attempted to represent the features of the face viewed in every possible direc-
tion. (Pliny, xxxv. 8, 34.) The period when Cimon lived is not known with
certainty; but his invention and method of study are eras in art too impor-
tant for his name to pass unmentioned.
<&
er,^
38 DEDICATION OF STATUES.
flattened externally ; their outline presents equally convex lines on the oppo-
site sides. There is little feeling or attempt at anatomical accuracy to be
perceived in these groups; and the hair is very remarkably expressed: there
is also a curious parallel between these works and the early coins of Mace-
donia. In both the same clumsiness of proportion and breadth of limb are
visible, but more especially on the coins of Lete and Oreskos. The early
coinage of Thasos displays very clumsy figures, which is the more remark-
able, as this city produced Polygnotus, the painter,-—one of the greatest
artists of his age,—at a period not very distant from that to which these coins
belong.
Portraiture, both in painting and sculpture, had already acquired suffi-
cient importance to be deemed an honourable testimony of friendship.
Solon, the relative of Pisistratus, when he visited Croesus, told him that the
Argives had caused statues to be made of the youths Cleobis and Biton, and
had dedicated them to the god at Delphi, in commemoration of their piety.
(Herod, i. 31.) Crcesus himself dedicated to the same divinity a golden statue,
said to be the portrait of his baking woman. Amasis, king of Egypt, sent
to Polycrates two statues of himself carved in wood at Samos, as an assurance
of his friendly disposition ; and to his father-in-law Arcesilaus, king of
Cyrene, he sent his own portrait. .
There is, in the French collection, a remarkable vase painting, which
represents Arcesilaus, king of Cyrene, surrounded by slaves and attendants,
packing silphium,—a celebrated article of commerce in that country. The
king's name is written over his head; and, although this picture cannot have
any value as a likeness, it is important as a production of antiquity. The
first instances of portrait statues being dedicated at the Olympian Games occur
about thirteen years after the accession of Pisistratus, and at the time when
the Persians captured Sardis (Pausanias, vi. 18, 5),'when statues of the
victorious athletee—Praxidamas of /Egina and Ehexibius of Opuntia—were
dedicated in Olympia. The statue of Ilhexibius was made of the wood of the
fig-tree, that of Praxidamas of cypress wood (b. c. 540, Olymp. 59). On the
expulsion of the Pisistratida;, Antiner was employed to make statues of Har-
modius and Aristogiton, which were afterwards carried off by Xerxes to Susa,
but restored by Alexander of Macedonia.
Pliny speaks of Cimon of Cleon®, who invented foreshortening, and who
attempted to represent the features of the face viewed in every possible direc-
tion. (Pliny, xxxv. 8, 34.) The period when Cimon lived is not known with
certainty; but his invention and method of study are eras in art too impor-
tant for his name to pass unmentioned.
<&
er,^