The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 4 (of 6)Pliny, the Elder
History
The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 4 (of 6)
Pliny, the Elder
Natural history -- Pre-Linnean works
For in early times it was the usage to crown the victors in the
sacred contests with branches of trees: and it was only at a later
period, that they began to vary their tints by the combination[1844]
of flowers, to heighten the effect in turn by their colour and their
smell—an invention due to the ingenuity of the painter Pausias, at
Sicyon,[1845] and the garland-maker Glycera, a female to whom he
was greatly attached, and whose handiwork was imitated by him in
colours. Challenging him to a trial of skill, she would repeatedly
vary her designs, and thus it was in reality a contest between art
and Nature; a fact which we find attested by pictures of that artist
even still in existence, more particularly the one known as the
“Stephaneplocos,”[1846] in which he has given a likeness of Glycera
herself. This invention, therefore, is only to be traced to later than
the Hundredth[1847] Olympiad.
Chaplets of flowers being now the fashion, it was not long before those
came into vogue which are known to us as Egyptian[1848] chaplets; and
then the winter chaplets, made for the time at which Earth refuses
her flowers, of thin laminæ of horn stained various colours. By slow
degrees, too, the name was introduced at Rome, these garlands being
known there at first as “corollæ,” a designation given them to express
the remarkable delicacy[1849] of their texture. In more recent times,
again, when the chaplets presented were made of thin plates[1850] of
copper, gilt or silvered, they assumed the name of “corollaria.”
CHAP. 4. (3.)—WHO WAS THE FIRST TO GIVE CHAPLETS WITH LEAVES OF SILVER
AND GOLD. LEMNISCI: WHO WAS THE FIRST TO EMBOSS THEM.
Crassus Dives[1851] was the first who gave chaplets with artificial
leaves of silver and gold, at the games celebrated by him. To embellish
these chaplets, and to confer additional honour on them, lemnisci were
added, in imitation of the Etruscan chaplets, which ought properly to
have none but lemnisci[1852] made of gold. For a long period these
lemnisci were destitute of ornament:[1853] P. Claudius Pulcher[1854]
was the first who taught us to emboss[1855] them, and added leaves of
tinsel to the laminæ[1856] of which the lemniscus was formed.
CHAP. 5.—THE GREAT HONOUR IN WHICH CHAPLETS WERE HELD BY THE ANCIENTS.
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