The Glory That Was Greece: a survey of Hellenic culture and civilisationStobart, J. C. (John Clarke)
History
The Glory That Was Greece: a survey of Hellenic culture and civilisation
Stobart, J. C. (John Clarke)
Art, Greek; Greece -- Civilization -- To 146 B.C.
Coins of Cnidos indicate the pose of the statue with sufficient
clearness for us to identify a Venus in the Vatican as a copy of the
Cnidian Aphrodite.[79] Papal decency has seen fit to encase her legs,
beginning just below the hips, with drapery constructed of tin. This
would, if anything could, impair the aspect of perfect modesty which
shows in every line of her pose and expression. She is not aware of
human spectators; there is no self-conscious prudery, as in the
abominable Medici Venus, which was an attempt by a later and baser
generation to imitate the same type. She has left her robe to hang over
the tall water-jar, and is stepping from or towards the bath, not
without shrinking, and not in ignorance of her beauty. Even in this
imperfect copy we recognise the qualities which made Lucian admire the
statue--“the design of the scalp and forehead, the finely pencilled
eyebrows, and the look of the eyes, so tender, yet so bright and
joyful.” He adds elsewhere that “a proud smile plays over her lips.” A
lovely girl’s head in Parian marble, now in the Glyptothek at Munich,
appears to me so clearly to resemble a younger sister of the same
goddess that it must bear some relation to an original by
Praxiteles.[80]
The Capitoline Gallery also possesses a copy of the “Young Satyr” of
Praxiteles, “called by the Greeks περιβοητός”--that is, world-famed.[81]
Readers of Hawthorne will remember his eloquent description of the
“Marble Faun,” and though we, better supplied with ancient originals,
can recognise that this is only _after_ (and not very near) Praxiteles,
yet even as it stands the statue has a peculiar charm and fascination.
The sculptor has conveyed the impression of a young creature of the
woods, only half human, shy and wild as an animal, and as
[Illustration: PLATE LXX. SCULPTURED COLUMN FROM THE TEMPLE OF ARTEMIS
AT EPHESUS
_Mansell & Co._]
careless and happy. His smile is as lazy as his attitude. Yet we notice
the reserve with which his animal characteristics are indicated merely
in the shape of his pointed ear and the “unclassical” profile of his
face. Not only is his weight thrown upon one leg, as in all the statues
by Praxiteles, but the other foot is gracefully curled round it. This is
the only complete ancient copy of the Satyr, but there is a mutilated
torso in the Louvre, so fine in its finish and texture that some critics
suppose it to be original.
Of the Eros which Phryne dedicated at Thespiæ we have no certain copies.
But it is evident that many of the Erotes in our galleries were inspired
by that masterpiece, and the prettiest is the Eros of Centocelle, a
three-quarters figure of admirable design, though of rather slack
execution.[82] I believe also that the bronze head of a youth at Naples
might well trace its parentage to an Eros by Praxiteles, though the
languishing craft of the eyes and the sensuous fullness of the lips are
certainly exaggerated.[83]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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