The “Hermes” is a beautiful example of the use such a sculptor as Praxiteles made of the new opportunities. The place it occupies in the history of the art is unique. Whereas most sculptures of its class are Roman copies, the “Hermes of Praxiteles” is an undoubted original. The marble was found at Olympia in 1877 A.D., on the very spot where Pausanias recorded having seen it. The find was preceded by the identification of a dipteral temple with an Heraion (Temple of Hera) also described by Pausanias. But this was of small interest compared with the statue which the German excavators discovered embedded in a fragment of wall. There was never any doubt as to its identity. It was clearly “the Hermes of stone, carrying the infant Dionysus—a work moreover by Praxiteles”—as Pausanias had recorded. Every one has seen a cast of the statue. The god is carrying the babe Dionysus to the nymphs. He has stopped for a moment’s rest and is amusing his little charge, may be with a bunch of grapes held in the right hand. The perfect grace of the figure and the pose are essentially Praxitelean. The work illustrates the softer and more sensuous manner of imaging the lesser divinities which arose in the fourth century. In this case the youthful god in the flush of early manhood must be contrasted with the “bearded” Hermes of the age of Phidias. After the time of Praxiteles there was no reversion to the earlier type. He did for Hermes and Apollo what Phidias and Polyclitus had done for Zeus and Hera. The influence of Praxiteles can be traced in a hundred kindred works produced during the next few centuries. In particular, it led to a fuller appreciation of the value of marble as a medium. Previously most of these single male statues had been bronze. The use of marble in turn led to increased technical skill. Take Praxiteles’ treatment of the hair in the “Hermes,” for instance. Note the massing of the locks, without an attempt at the realistic representation of the details, and the skilful use of the play of light and shade which such free treatment makes possible. THE INFLUENCE OF GREEK WOMANHOOD But even these factors, potent though they were, do not account for the whole of the increased scope afforded to the fourth-century sculptor. We have passed in review various circumstances, political, economic, intellectual and moral. But we have said nothing of a good half of Greek society—the women. Yet the influence exerted by the fairer sex, negatively upon fifth-century, positively upon fourth-century, sculpture was all-important. It must not be overlooked if we would gain a complete understanding of either phase of Hellenic art. Speaking generally, women occupied a place in Greek society which cannot be readily illustrated from our modern experience. The earliest Greek women is pictured in the pages of Homer. The typical wife is Penelope; the typical virgin is Nausicaa. To Homer, the wife is the trusted friend of her husband. The current belief is that