DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.5309#0090
SOPHOCLES.
The resemblance of these two busts leads us to believe that they were intended for
the same subject ; that on the left hand was discovered some years ago at Rome,
amidst the rubbish of the Temple of Peace, and the name of Sophocles was found
written upon it precisely as we see in the copy : with regard to the other, the Author
of this Museum had it dug out of the ruins of the Prytanaeum, when he visited the city
of Athens in the year 1785 ; but this may be said to be a blind bust, for no name
appeared, nor the least trace of writing on any part of it, so as to give a hint about the
purpose of the artist, or the person, whom he meant to represent. However, by com-
bining the features and cast of each design, we think that the subject of both may be
identified on the most rational conjecture. The only material disparity, that can be per-
ceived, is in the age ; which proves nothing more but that the portraits were executed
at different times. Athenams1 tells us, that Sophocles displayed his poetical talents as
early as in the eighteenth year of his age ; and Valerius Maximus affirms, that he had
lived almost a full century when he composed the tragedy of CEdipus Colonaeus. He
wrote an hundred and twenty plays, of which we have but seven left. Ovid, in his
fifteenth elegy of the first book of his Art of Love, after bestowing encomiums on
Homer, Hesiod, and Callimachus, says, that the tragedies of Sophocles will eternize
the splendour of his fame.
51
The resemblance of these two busts leads us to believe that they were intended for
the same subject ; that on the left hand was discovered some years ago at Rome,
amidst the rubbish of the Temple of Peace, and the name of Sophocles was found
written upon it precisely as we see in the copy : with regard to the other, the Author
of this Museum had it dug out of the ruins of the Prytanaeum, when he visited the city
of Athens in the year 1785 ; but this may be said to be a blind bust, for no name
appeared, nor the least trace of writing on any part of it, so as to give a hint about the
purpose of the artist, or the person, whom he meant to represent. However, by com-
bining the features and cast of each design, we think that the subject of both may be
identified on the most rational conjecture. The only material disparity, that can be per-
ceived, is in the age ; which proves nothing more but that the portraits were executed
at different times. Athenams1 tells us, that Sophocles displayed his poetical talents as
early as in the eighteenth year of his age ; and Valerius Maximus affirms, that he had
lived almost a full century when he composed the tragedy of CEdipus Colonaeus. He
wrote an hundred and twenty plays, of which we have but seven left. Ovid, in his
fifteenth elegy of the first book of his Art of Love, after bestowing encomiums on
Homer, Hesiod, and Callimachus, says, that the tragedies of Sophocles will eternize
the splendour of his fame.
51