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which he generally uses in opposition to avróxoves. On the other hand, it by no means follows that the term éλudes implies more than a population which supplants another, whether that other were or were not the original one of the country. In this instance,

Herodotus has previously stated (ι. 173), οἱ δὲ Λύκιοι ἐκ Κρήτης τὠρχαῖον γεγόνασι: he then goes on to say that the country was formerly (To Taλauóv) called Miλvás, and that the Milya were then termed Solymi. The population subdued by Harpagus was evidently the second in this series, not the first, and all these facts appear inconsistent with the late existence of a distinct Lycian race, who maintained their Asiatic character, and were the dominant people of Xanthus down to its capture by Harpagus (see Mr. Fellows' Second Tour, 252, 253, 254)2.

Colonel Leake's remarks on the style and as follows (Letter to Mr. Hamilton, p. 7):

age

of this frieze are

"The style of art belongs to the end of the fifth or the beginning of the fourth century B. c. The sculptures may nevertheless represent the capture of Xanthus by Harpagus in the middle of the sixth, for Lycia was tributary to Persia for more than two centuries after that event; and Xanthus, as the chief city, was probably the residence of a Persian agent, and was partly governed, like the other cities and provinces of Asia Minor, by native magistrates supported by Persia."

On the assertion that the style belongs to the end of the fifth or beginning of the fourth century a note is added.

"This perhaps may be questioned, and a century or two later may be thought a preferable date: but history would be opposed to it. After the death of Alexander, Western Asia became the scene of conflict between military chieftains, not satraps, although at first so called, but sovereigns with despotic power, contending against one another at the head of large armies; a condition most unfavourable to the arts of peace and the prosperity of the smaller towns: especially as these Greek kings were at the same time bestowing their influence and wealth on the chief cities, Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamus, and Sardes, and on the numerous new towns rising in various parts of Asia Minor, which were named in honour of Alexander, Antigonus, Seleucus, Attalus, Eumenes, and Apame."

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2 Thus Mr. Fellows (Second Tour, pp. as well, and over one of the figures is 116, 117), mentions a tomb at Cadyanda with Lycian inscriptions over the figures, and sometimes the Greek names are given

EKTOP, thus again proving the contemporary currency of the two languages, and of the Greek poetical narratives.

There seems little to object to in the conclusions thus arrived at by Col. Leake. The composition of the frieze would perhaps lead us, as he says, to assign it to a later period. The groups are complicated and picturesque in their arrangement, rather than marked by that simplicity with which the figures in the best Greek works of this kind usually detach themselves from the ground; at the same time, the work, though not of extraordinary merit, is good. We know so little of the history of art in Asia Minor as yet, that it is rash to guess at any thing like the exact date of a monument by its style or execution. Moreover, if Professor Thiersch's view of the progress of sculpture be in the main true, that is to say, if from the time of Phidias to that of Hadrian art never sunk below a certain pitch of excellence, it is manifestly most difficult to assign a date to any given work executed between these periods on mere intrinsic evidence of style and merit. It can scarcely be maintained, that either of the two long friezes, or the draped figures which were brought from Xanthus with them, can claim a date anterior to the time of Phidias. The latter statues, indeed, bear a manifest resemblance to the works of the Athenian school in the treatment of the drapery, but are less perfect in form, and less successful in execution. There is no want of technical skill, perhaps, in dealing with the marble, but there are certain conventional peculiarities which cannot be considered as improvements. Thus the thin projecting edges of the light folds are generally channeled with a sort of groove, which may have given lightness, but must have injured the breadth of effect.

All that we know of the state of art before the time of Phidias, would lead us to consider it extremely improbable that in a remote Greek settlement like Xanthus, sculpture should have been at least half a century in advance of the position which it held at Athens.

C. O. Müller sums up our knowledge of this position in the following words (de Vita et Oper. Phidiæ. 56): “Callonis Æginetæ, quem post Olympiadem LX floruisse arbitrantur, signa duriora et Tuscanicis proxima fuisse; etiam Canachi Sicyonii, qui circa tempus bellorum Persicorum florebat, rigidiora quam ut veritatem imitentur; deinde Hegiam Critiamque, Canachi æquales ob accuratam quidem sed severiorem lineamentorum descriptionem atque nervos et toros austerius indicatos notari; jam minus rigida fuisse Calamidos, artificis egregii mox insecuti, signa; atque molliora omnibus supradictis Myronem fecisse, Phidiæ æqualem, neque tamen etiam hæc satis ad veritatem adducta, ita ut, quam tenaciter arti etiam florentissimæ priscus quidam rigor inhæserit,

appareat: quo magis observandum est, hunc ab antiquis nunquam reprehendi in Phidia." (Compare Handbuch der Kunst, § 92. 1).

Müller's authority is so great on this subject, that it is needless to refer to the passages of ancient authors which support these views, or to confirm them by quoting other modern writers. The fact then is, that through the genius of Phidias art made one of those sudden advances which seem necessary conditions of its progress, and to which the history of modern painting may supply an analogous instance. It is difficult to convince ourselves that the Sposalizio in the Brera and the Transfiguration were both the work of one man, who, after all, died at the age of 37. The vigorous genius of Michael Angelo had broken through the obstacles which still impeded art, and on the stock planted by him, Raphael grafted and caused to ripen into full maturity his own feeling for gentle beauty, and his own power of expressing every variety of human emotion. M. Angelo and Phidias hold an analogous position in their relation to the masters who preceded them; and it may be allowable to say, that in both there is visible something of the same exulting consciousness of difficulty overcome, sporting, as it were, with the material which perpetually checked and fettered the efforts of inferior artists.

It would seem therefore in the highest degree improbable that the execution of that portion of the Xanthian Marbles now under consideration, should have preceded, or have been contemporary with, the crisis in the history of sculpture to which allusion has just been made.

Our scanty means of comparison with existing monuments would lead us to the same result. We have no means of ascertaining the date of the bas relief in the Villa Albani already alluded to, nor of that of Agamemnon and Talthybius, for the existence of the on the latter affords no certain guide. The rude and singular metopes from Selinus are certainly not anterior to the 38th or 40th Olympiad (see Thiersch, Epochen der Gr. Kunst, p. 420, sqq.); and the Æginetan marbles in all probability are subsequent to the victory of Salamis (see Müller, Handbuch, § 90. 3). Now between the stiffness of these latter works and the flying drapery and complicated composition of the friezes and statues from Xanthus, there is an enormous interval. This interval, it is true, as we have seen, need not be one of time, but it involves just such a crisis as took

3 It is disputed whether this is an Q, but a careful inspection of the monument itself leaves little room for doubt.

place through the agency of Phidias, be the years few or many which were occupied in bringing it about.

Again, to approach still nearer to the locality of Xanthus, those ancient fragments of sitting figures in the sacred way to the temple of Apollo at Branchidæ near Miletus appear to bear all the marks of the most severe and rigid stiffness of the early school of art. On one of these there is an inscription relating apparently to their dedication, (see Leake, Journal of a Tour in Asia Minor, p. 240, Letter on the inscribed Monument at Xanthus, p. 14). This inscription is thus commented on by Bockh (Corpus Inscr. Gr. 1. p. 55). "Forma elementorum vetus est sed scriptura Ionica quæ Simonidea dicitur. Vocales insunt H et et composita consona E : BovσTρondov tamen tum, quum Ionicæ litteræ vulgo usitata essent, vix arbitror ex communi usu scripsisse Græcos, et videtur mihi hæc scribendi ratio tam hic quam in Sigeensi inscriptione ex antiquioris temporis consuetudine de industria assumpta esse. Ceterum titulus potest Simonideam attingere ætatem : etiam Σ tum jam notum fuisse docet Hieronis inscriptio: in nostro titulo id bis cernitur accurate expressum, minus distincte in tertiâ lineâ.”

Whether, therefore, we look to the apparent interval between these Xanthian works and the few earlier remains which are accessible to us, or whether we compare them with the style of the marbles of Phigalia, known to be contemporary with those of the Parthenon (see Müller, Handbuch, § 118. 3. Pausanias, vIII. 41. 9), and with the works of Phidias himself, the result is the same; we must not attempt to give them a date approaching that of the event represented on the frieze, by at least a century or a century and a half-and it seems likely from internal evidence that they should be placed still later.

So much time has been spent in discussing questions which suggested themselves, in connexion with the representation of the capture of Xanthus, that allusion can scarcely be made to the other frieze, and the remaining fragments. The former consists of slabs larger than those on which the conquest of Harpagus is sculptured. The execution of the work is inferior to its conception; many of the attitudes and motives have great spirit and beauty.

Whilst all must sincerely rejoice that Mr. Fellows's public spirit and enterprize have enabled him to secure remains of so much interest for our national museum, it is to be hoped that this harvest is not the last which we shall reap from the same country through his exertions.

E. W. HEAD.

ON THE SO CALLED MONUMENT OF SESOSTRIS IN ASIA MINOR.

WHEN I wrote the notice of the discovery of the monument of Sesostris in Asia Minor, (Class. Mus. p. 82 foll.) I was led into one or two errors by the source from which I derived my information; and I have great pleasure in giving publicity to a letter addressed to the Editor of the Classical Museum by the Rev. Henry John Rose, in which these errors are corrected. The most important of them, of which however I was aware before receiving Mr. Rose's letter, who remarks upon it in a postscript, is, that the monument recently discovered is not the one on the road from Ephesus to Phocæa, which, as far as I am aware, no one has yet seen; but the one on the road from Smyrna to Sardis1. The other error respecting the priority of the discovery will be best explained by Mr. Rose's own letter, though I must state that the ground on which the discovery was attributed to Dr. von Eckenbrecher2, was a mere report which Prof. Welcker heard at Smyrna, and in consequence of which he visited the place, conducted by a Turkish guide who assured him that he had already conducted several travellers to the spot.

66

Sir,

To the EDITOR of the CLASSICAL MUSEUM.

"I feel assured that you will have pleasure in communicating to the public the following circumstances relative to the recent discovery of the figures made by Sesostris in Asia Minor.

"You have attributed (p. 82 of No. 1) the discovery of one of these figures to Dr. von Eckenbrecher. I am prepared to show that it was discovered by a countryman of our own, above 25 years ago; and, I believe, that I can trace this new discovery of it to an indirect communication from this country.

"the

'Into this error I was led by the words of Professor Welcker, who says, monument of Sesostris on the road from Ephesus to Phocæa, which is mentioned by Herodotus, and which, as I was told at Smyrna, was first discovered by Dr. von Eckenbrecher," &c. How he could

make this mistake, is almost inconceivable, as he had been at Nymphi and seen the monument.

2 Dr. von Eckenbrecher himself has never published any thing upon this monument, so that I am unable to say what claims he makes to the discovery.

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