Translated by H.Rackham (1952), with some minor alterations. Click on the L symbols to go to the Latin text of each chapter.
← Book 33
{I.} L [1] Let our next subject be ores, etc., of copper and bronze, the metals which in point of utility have the next value; in fact Corinthian bronze is valued before silver and almost even before gold; and bronze is also the standard of payments in money as we have said: hence it is embodied in the terms denoting the pay of soldiers, the treasury paymasters { tribuni aerarii } and the public treasury, persons held in debt, and soldiers whose pay is stopped. We have pointed out for what a long time the Roman nation used no coinage except bronze; and by another fact antiquity shows that the importance of bronze is as old as the city - the fact that the third corporation established by King Numa was the Guild of Coppersmiths.
{2.} L [2] The method followed in mining deposits of copper and purifying the ore by firing is that which has been stated. The metal is also got from a coppery stone called by a Greek name cadmea, a kind in high repute coming from overseas and also formerly found in Campania and at the present day in the territory of Bergomum on the farthest confines of Italy; and it is also reported to have been recently found in the province of Germany. In Cyprus, where copper was first discovered, it is also obtained from another stone also, called chalcitis, copper ore; this was however afterwards of exceptionally low value when a better copper was found in other countries, and especially gold-copper, which long maintained an outstanding quality and popularity, but which for a long time now has not been found, the ground being exhausted. [3] The next in quality was the Sallustius copper, occurring in the Alpine region of the Ceutrones, though this also only lasted a short time; and after it came the Livia copper in Gaul: each was named from the owners of the mines, the former from the friend of Augustus and the latter from his wife. [4] Livia copper also quickly gave out: at all events it is found in very small quantity. The highest reputation has now gone to the Marius copper, also called Corduba copper; next to the Livia variety this kind most readily absorbs cadmea and reproduces the excellence of gold-copper in making sesterces and double-as pieces, the single as having to be content with its proper Cyprus copper. That is the extent of the high quality contained in natural bronze and copper.
{3.} L [5] The remaining kinds are made artificially, and will be described in their proper places, the most distinguished sorts being indicated first of all. Formerly copper used to be blended with a mixture of gold and silver, and nevertheless artistry was valued more highly than the metal; but nowadays it is a doubtful point whether the workmanship or the material is worse, and it is a surprising thing that, though the prices paid for these works of art have grown beyond all limit, the importance attached to this craftsmanship of working in metals has quite disappeared. For this, which formerly used to be practised for the sake of glory - consequently it was even attributed to the workmanship of gods, and the leading men of all the nations used to seek for reputation by this method also - has now, like everything else, begun to be practised for the sake of gain; and the method of casting costly works of art in bronze has so gone out that for a long time now not even luck in this matter has had the privilege of producing art.
[6] Of the bronze which was renowned in early days, the Corinthian is the most highly praised. This is a compound that was produced by accident, when Corinth was burned at the time of its capture; and there has been a wonderful mania among many people for possessing this metal - in fact it is recorded that Verres, whose conviction Marcus Cicero had procured, was, together with Cicero, proscribed by Antonius for no other reason than because he had refused to give up to Antonius some pieces of Corinthian ware; and to me the majority of these collectors seem only to make a pretence of being connoisseurs, so as to separate themselves from the multitude, rather than to have any exceptionally refined insight in this matter; and this I will briefly show. [7] Corinth was taken in the third year of the 158th Olympiad, which was the 608th year {146 BC} of our city, when for ages there had no longer been any famous artists in metalwork; yet these persons designate all the specimens of their work as Corinthian bronzes. In order therefore to refute them we will state the periods to which these artists belong; of course it will be easy to turn the Olympiads into the years since the foundation of our city by referring to the two corresponding dates given above. The only genuine Corinthian_bronze Corinthian vessels are then those which your connoisseurs sometimes convert into dishes for food and sometimes into lamps or even washing basins, without nice regard for decency. [8] There are three kinds of this sort of bronze: a white variety, coming very near to silver in brilliance, in which the alloy of silver predominates; a second kind, in which the yellow quality of gold predominates, and a third kind in which all the metals were blended in equal proportions. Besides these there is another mixture the formula for which cannot be given, although it is man's handiwork; but the bronze valued in portrait statues and others for its peculiar colour, approaching the appearance of liver and consequently called by a Greek name 'hepatizon' meaning 'liverish,' is a blend produced by luck; it is far behind the Corinthian_bronze Corinthian blend, yet a long way in front of the bronze of Aegina and that of Delos which long held the first rank.
{4.} L [9] The Delian bronze was the earliest to become famous, the whole world thronging the markets in Delos; and hence the attention paid to the processes of making it. It was at Delos that bronze first came into prominence as a material used for the feet and framework of dining-couches, and later it came to be employed also for images of the gods and statues of men and other living things.
{5.} L [10] The next most famous bronze was the Aeginetan; and the island of Aegina itself became celebrated for it, though not because the metal copper was mined there but because of the compounding done in the workshops. A bronze ox looted from Aegina stands in the cattle-market at Rome, and will serve as a specimen of Aegina bronze, while that of Delos is seen in the Jupiter in the temple of Jupiter the Thunderer on the Capitol. Aegina bronze was used by Myron and that from Delos by Polyclitus, who were contemporaries and fellow-pupils; thus there was rivalry between them even in their choice of materials.
{6.} L [11] Aegina specialized in producing only the upper parts of chandeliers, and similarly Tarentum made only the stems, and consequently credit for manufacture is, in the matter of these articles, shared between these two localities. Nor are people ashamed to buy these at a price equal to the pay of a military tribune, although they clearly take even their name from the lighted candles they carry. At the sale of a chandelier of this sort by the instructions of the auctioneer (named Theon) selling it there was thrown in as part of the bargain the fuller Clesippus a humpback and also of a hideous appearance in other respects besides, the lot being bought by a woman named Gegania for 50,000 sesterces. This woman gave a party to show off her purchases, and for the mockery of the guests the man appeared with no clothes on; [12] his mistress conceiving an outrageous passion for him admitted him to her bed and later gave him a place in her will. Thus becoming excessively rich he worshipped the lamp-stand in question as a divinity and so caused this story to be attached to Corinthian lampstands in general, though the claims of morality were vindicated by his erecting a noble tombstone to perpetuate throughout the living world for all time the memory of Gegania's shame. But although it is admitted that there are no lampstands made of Corinthian metal, yet this name specially is commonly attached to them, because although Mummius's victory destroyed Corinth, it caused the dispersal of bronzes from a number of the towns of Achaia at the same time.
{7.} L [13] In early times the lintels and folding doors of temples as well were commonly made of bronze. I find that also Gnaeus Octavius, who was granted a triumph {167 BC} after a sea-fight against King Perseus, constructed the double colonnade at the Flaminian circus which owing to the bronze capitals of its columns has received the name of the Corinthian portico, and that a resolution was passed that even the temple of Vesta should have its roof covered with an outer coating of Syracusan metal. The capitals of the pillars in the Pantheon which were put up by Marcus Agrippa {27 BC} are of Syracusan metal. Moreover even private opulence has been employed in similar uses: one of the charges brought against Camillus by the quaestor Spurius Carvilius {391 BC} was that in his house he had doors covered with bronze.
{8.} L [14] Again, according to Lucius Piso dinner-couches and panelled sideboards and one-leg tables decorated with bronze were first introduced by Gnaeus Manlius at the triumph which he celebrated in the 567th year of the city {187 BC} after the conquest of Asia; and as a matter of fact Antias states that the heirs of Lucius Crassus the orator also sold a number of dinner couches decorated with bronze. It was even customary for bronze to be used for making the cauldrons on tripods called Delphic cauldrons because they used to be chiefly dedicated as gifts to Apollo of Delphi; also lamp-holders were popular suspended from the ceiling, in temples or with their lights arranged to look like apples hanging on trees, like the specimen in the temple of Apollo of the Palatine which had been part of the booty taken by Alexander the Great at the storming of Thebes {335 BC} and dedicated by him to the same deity at Cyme.
{9.} L [15] But after a time this art in all places came to be usually devoted to statues of gods. I find that the first image of a god made of bronze at Rome was that dedicated to Ceres and paid for out of the property of Spurius Cassius who was put to death by his own father when trying to make himself king {485 BC}. The practice passed over from the gods to statues and representations of human beings also, in various forms. In early days people used to stain statues with bitumen, which makes it the more remarkable that they afterwards became fond of covering them with gold. This was perhaps a Roman invention, but it certainly has a name of no long standing at Rome. [16] It was not customary to make effigies of human beings unless they deserved lasting commemoration for some distinguished reason, in the first case victory in the sacred contests and particularly those at Olympia, where it was the custom to dedicate statues of all who had won a competition; these statues, in the case of those who had been victorious there three times, were modelled as exact personal likenesses of the winners - what are called iconicae, portrait statues. [17] I rather believe that the first portrait statues officially erected at Athens were those of the tyrannicides Harmodius and Aristogeiton. This happened in the same year as that in which the kings were also driven out at Rome {510 BC}. The practice of erecting statues from a most civilized sense of rivalry was afterwards taken up by the whole of the world, and the custom proceeded to arise of having statues adorning the public places of all municipal towns and of perpetuating the memory of human beings and of inscribing lists of honours on the bases to be read for all time, so that such records should not be read on their tombs only. Soon after a publicity centre was established even in private houses and in our own halls: the respect felt by clients inaugurated this method of doing honour to their patrons.
{10.} L [18] In old days the statues dedicated were simply clad in the toga. Also naked figures holding spears, made from models of Greek young men from the gymnasiums - what are called figures of Achilles - became popular. The Greek practice is to leave the figure entirely nude, whereas Roman and military statuary adds a breastplate: indeed the dictator Caesar gave permission for a statue wearing a cuirass to be erected in his honour in his forum. As for the statues in the garb of the Luperci, they are modern innovations, just as much as the portrait-statues dressed in cloaks that have recently appeared. Mancinus set up a statue of himself in the dress that he had worn when surrendered to the enemy. [19] It has been remarked by writers that the poet Lucius Accius also set up a very tall statue of himself in the shrine of the Latin Muses, although he was a very short man. Assuredly equestrian statues are popular at Rome, the fashion for them having no doubt been derived from Greece; but the Greeks used only to erect statues of winners of races on horseback at their sacred contests, although subsequently they also erected statues of winners with two-horse or four-horse chariots; and this is the origin of our chariot-groups in honour of those who have celebrated a triumphal procession. But this belongs to a late date, and among those monuments it was not till the time of the deified Augustus that chariots with six horses occurred, and likewise elephants.
{11.} L [20] The custom of erecting memorial chariots with two horses in the case of those who held the office of praetor and had ridden round the Circus in a chariot is not an old one; that of statues on pillars is of earlier date, for instance the statue of honour of Gaius Maenius who had vanquished the Old Latins {338 BC}, to whom the Roman nation gave by treaty a third part of the booty won from them. It was in the same consulship that the nation, after defeating the people of Antium, had fixed on the platform the beaked prows of ships taken in the victory over the people of Antium, in the 416th year of the city of Rome; and similarly the statue to Gaius Duillius, who was the first to obtain a naval triumph over the Carthaginians {260 BC} - this statue still stands in the forum - [21] and likewise that in honour of the prefect of markets { praefectus annonae } Lucius Minucius outside the Porta Trigemina {439 BC}, defrayed by a tax of one-twelfth of an as per head. I rather think this was the first time that an honour of this nature came from the whole people; previously it had been bestowed by the senate: it would be a very distinguished honour had it not originated on such unimportant occasions. In fact also the statue of Attus Navius stood in front of the senate-house - when the senate-house was set on fire at the funeral of Publius Clodius {52 BC} the base of the statue was burnt with it; and the statue of Hermodorus of Ephesus the interpreter of the laws drafted by the decemvirs {451/0 BC}, dedicated at the public cost, stood in the assembly-place { comitium } of Rome. [22] There was a different motive and another reason - an important one - for the statue of Marcus Horatius Cocles, which has survived even to the present day; it was erected because he had single-handed barred the enemy's passage of the Bridge on Piles { Pons Sublicius }. Also, it does not at all surprise me that statues of the Sibyl stand near the Beaked Platform { Rostra }, though there are three of them - one restored by Sextus Pacuvius Taurus, aedile of the plebs, and two by Marcus Messalla. I should think these statues and that of Attus Navius, all erected in the period of Tarquinius Priscus {616-579 BC}, were the first, if it were not for the statues on the Capitol of the kings who reigned before him, [23] among them the figures of Romulus and Tatius without the tunic, as also that of Camillus on the Rostra. Also there was in front of the temple of the Castors an equestrian statue of Quintus Marcius Tremulus, wearing a toga ; he had twice vanquished the Samnites, and by taking Anagni {c. 305 BC} delivered the nation from payment of war-tax. Among the very old statues are also those at the Rostra of Tullus Cloelius, Lucius Roscius, Spurius Nautius, and Gaius Fulcinius, all assassinated by the people of Fidenae when on an embassy to them {438 BC}. [24] It was the custom for the state to confer this honour on those who had been wrongfully put to death, as among others Publius Junius and Titus Coruncanius, who had been killed by Teuta the Queen of the Illyrians {230 BC}. It would seem not to be proper to omit the fact noted by the annals that the statues of these persons, erected in the forum, were three feet in height, showing that this was the scale of these marks of honour in those days. I will not pass over the case of Gnaeus Octavius also, because of a single word that occurs in a decree of the Senate. When king Antiochus said he intended to answer him, Octavius with the stick he happened to be holding in his hand drew a line all round him and compelled him to give his answer before he stepped out of the circle. And as Octavius was killed while on this embassy {162 BC}, the senate ordered a statue to be erected to him 'in the spot most eyed' and that statue stands on the Rostra. [25] We also find that a decree was passed to erect a statue to a Vestal Virgin named Taracia Gaia or Fufetia 'to be placed where she wished,' an addition that is as great a compliment as the fact that a statue was decreed in honour of a woman. For the Vestal's merits I will quote the actual words of the Annals: 'because she had made a gratuitous present to the nation of the field by the Tiber.'
{12.} L [26] I also find that statues were erected to Pythagoras and to Alcibiades, in the corners of the comitium, when during one of our Samnite Wars {343 BC} Pythian Apollo had commanded the erection in some conspicuous position of an effigy of the bravest man of the Greek race, and likewise, one of the wisest man; these remained until Sulla the dictator made the Senate-house on the site {80 BC}. It is surprising that those illustrious senators of ours rated Pythagoras above Socrates, whom the same deity had put above all the rest of mankind in respect of wisdom, or rated Alcibiades above so many other men in manly virtue, or anybody above Themistocles for wisdom and manly virtue combined.
[27] The purport of placing statues of men on columns was to elevate them above all other mortals; which is also the meaning conveyed by the new invention of arches. Nevertheless the honour originally began with the Greeks, and I do not think that any person ever had more statues erected to him than Demetrius of Phalerum had at Athens, inasmuch as they set up 360, at a period when the year did not yet exceed that number of days, statues however the Athenians soon shattered in pieces. At Rome also the tribes in all the districts set up statues to Marius Gratidianus, as we have stated, and likewise threw them down again at the entrance of Sulla.
{13.} L [28] Statues of persons on foot undoubtedly held the field at Rome for a long time; equestrian statues also however are of considerable antiquity, and this distinction was actually extended to women with the equestrian statue of Cloelia, as if it were not enough for her to be clad in a toga, although statues were not voted to Lucretia and Brutus, who had driven out the kings owing to whom Cloelia had been handed over with others as a hostage. [29] I should have held the view that her statue and that of Cocles were the first erected at the public expense {509/8 BC}- for it is probable that the monuments to Attus and the Sibyl were erected by Tarquinius and those of the kings by themselves - were it not for the statement of Piso that the statue of Cloelia also was erected by the persons who had been hostages with her, when they were given back by Porsena, as a mark of honour to her; whereas on the other hand Annius Fetialis states that an equestrian figure which once stood opposite the temple of Jupiter Stator in the forecourt of Tarquinius Superbus's palace was the statue of Valeria, daughter of Publicola, the consul, and that she alone had escaped and had swum across the Tiber, the other hostages who were being sent to Porsena having been made away with by a stratagem of Tarquinius.
{14.} L [30] Lucius Piso has recorded that, in the second consulship of Marcus Aemilius and Gaius Popilius {158 BC}, the censors Publius Cornelius Scipio and Marcus Popilius caused all the statues round the forum of men who had held office as magistrates to be removed excepting those that had been set up by a resolution of the people or the Senate, while the statue which Spurius Cassius, who had aspired to monarchy {485 BC}, had erected in his own honour before the temple of Tellus {"Earth"} was actually melted down by censors: obviously the men of those days took precautions against ambition in the matter of statues also. [31] Some declamatory utterances made by Cato during his censorship {184 BC} are extant protesting against the erection in the Roman provinces of statues to women; yet all the same he was powerless to prevent this being done at Rome also: for instance there is the statue of Cornelia the mother of the Gracchi and daughter of the elder Scipio Africanus. This represents her in a sitting position and is remarkable because there are no straps to the shoes; it stood in the public colonnade of Metellus, but is now in Octavia's Buildings.
{15.} L [32] The first statue publicly erected at Rome by foreigners was that in honour of the tribune of the people Gaius Aelius, for having introduced a law against Sthennius Stallius the Lucanian who had twice made an attack upon Thurii {285 BC}; for this the inhabitants of that place presented Aelius with a statue and a crown of gold. The same people afterwards presented Fabricius with a statue for having rescued them from a state of siege {283 BC}; and various races successively in some such way placed themselves under Roman patronage, and all discrimination was so completely abrogated that even a statue of Hannibal may be seen in three places in the city within the walls of which he alone of its national foes had hurled a spear.
{16.} L [33] That the art of statuary was familiar to Italy also and of long standing there is indicated by the statue of Hercules in the Cattle Market { Forum Boarium } said to have been dedicated by Evander, which is called 'Hercules Triumphant,' and on the occasion of triumphal processions is arrayed in triumphal vestments; and also by the two-faced Janus, dedicated by King Numa, which is worshipped as indicating war and peace, the fingers of the statue being so arranged as to indicate the 355 days of the year, and to show that Janus is the god of the duration of time. [34] Also there is no doubt that the so-called Etruscan images scattered all over the world were regularly made in Etruria. I should have supposed these to have been statues of deities only, were it not that Metrodorus of Scepsis, who received his surname from his hatred of the very name of Rome, reproached us with having taken by storm the city of Volsinii for the sake of the 2000 statues which it contained {264 BC}. And it seems to me surprising that although the initiation of statuary in Italy dates so far back, the images of the gods dedicated in the shrines should have been more usually of wood or terracotta right down to the conquest of Asia which introduced luxury here.
[35] What was the first origin of representing likenesses in the round will be more suitably discussed when we are dealing with the art for which the Greek term is plastic, as that was earlier than the art of bronze statuary. But the latter has flourished to an extent passing all limit and offers a subject that would occupy many volumes if one wanted to give a rather extensive account of it - for as for a completely exhaustive account, who could achieve that?
{ 17.} L [36] In the aedileship of Marcus Scaurus {58 BC} there were 3000 statues on the stage in what was only a temporary theatre. Mummius after conquering Achaia {146 BC} filled the city with statues, though destined not to leave enough at his death to provide a dowry for his daughter - for why not mention this as well as the fact that excuses it? A great many were also imported by the Luculli. Yet it is stated by Mucianus who was three times consul that there are still 3000 statues at Rhodes, and no smaller number are believed still to exist at Athens, Olympia and Delphi. [37] What mortal man could recapitulate them all, or what value can be felt in such information? Still it may give pleasure just to allude to the most remarkable and to name the artists of celebrity, though it would be impossible to enumerate the total number of the works of each, inasmuch as Lysippus is said to have executed 1500 works of art, all of them so skilful that each of them by itself might have made him famous; the number is said to have been discovered after his decease, when his heir broke open his coffers, it having been his practice to put aside a coin of the value of one gold denarius out of what he got as reward for his handicraft for each statue.
[38] The art rose to incredible heights in success and afterwards in boldness of design. To prove its success I will adduce one instance, and that not of a representation of either a god or a man: our own generation saw on the Capitol, before it last went up in flames burnt at the hands of the adherents of Vitellius, in the shrine of Juno, a bronze figure of a hound licking its wound, the miraculous excellence and absolute truth to life of which is shown not only by the fact of its dedication in that place but also by the method taken for insuring it; for as no sum of money seemed to equal its value, the government enacted that its custodians should be answerable for its safety with their lives.
{18.} L [39] Of boldness of design the examples are innumerable. We see enormously huge statues devised, what are called Colossi, as large as towers. Such is the Apollo on the Capitol, brought over by Marcus Lucullus {73 BC} from Apollonia, a city of Pontus, 45 feet high, which cost 500 talents to make; [40] or the Jupiter which the Emperor Claudius dedicated in the Campus Martius, which is dwarfed by the proximity of the Theatre of Pompeius; or the 60 feet high statue at Tarentum made by Lysippus. The remarkable thing in the case of the last is that though it can be moved by the hand, it is so nicely balanced, so it is said, that it is not dislodged from its place by any storms. This indeed, it is said, the artist himself provided against by erecting a column a short distance from it to shelter it on the side where it was most necessary to break the force of the wind. Accordingly, because of its size, and the difficulty of moving it with great labour, Fabius Verrucosus left it alone when he transferred the Hercules from that place to the Capitol where it now stands {209 BC}. [41] But calling for admiration before all others was the colossal Statue of the Sun at Rhodes made by Chares of Lindus, the pupil of Lysippus mentioned above. This statue was 105 feet high; and, 66 years after its erection, was overthrown by an earthquake {c. 226 BC}, but even lying on the ground it is a marvel. Few people can make their arms meet round the thumb of the figure, and the fingers are larger than most statues; and where the limbs have been broken off enormous cavities yawn, while inside are seen great masses of rock with the weight of which the artist steadied it when he erected it. It is recorded that it took twelve years to complete and cost 300 talents, money realized from the engines of war belonging to King Demetrius which he had abandoned when he got tired of the protracted siege of Rhodes {304 BC}. [42] There are a hundred other colossal statues in the same city, which though smaller than this one would have each of them brought fame to any place where it might have stood alone; and besides these there were five colossal statues of gods, made by Bryaxis.
[43] Italy also was fond of making colossal statues. At all events we see the Etruscan Apollo in the library of the temple of Augustus, 50 feet in height measuring from the toe; and it is a question whether it is more remarkable for the quality of the bronze or for the beauty of the work. Spurius Carvilius also made the Jupiter that stands in the Capitol, after defeating the Samnites in the war which they fought under a most solemn oath {293 BC}; the metal was obtained from their breastplates, greaves and helmets, and the size of the figure is so great that it can be seen from the Temple of Jupiter Latiaris. Out of the bronze filings left over Carvilius made the statue of himself that stands at the feet of the statue of Jupiter. [44] The Capitol also contains two much admired heads dedicated by the consul Publius Lentulus {57 BC}, one made by Chares above-mentioned and the other by Prodicus, who is so outdone by comparison as to seem the poorest of artists. [45] But all the gigantic statues of this class have been beaten in our period by Zenodorus with the Mercury which he made in the community of the Arverni in Gaul; it took him ten years and the sum paid for its making was 40,000,000 sesterces. Having given sufficient proof of his artistic skill in Gaul he was summoned to Rome by Nero, and there made the Colossal Statue, 106 feet high, intended to represent that emperor but now, dedicated to the sun after the condemnation of that emperor's crimes, it is an object of awe. [46] In his studio we used not only to admire the remarkable likeness of the clay model but also to marvel at the frame of quite small timbers which constituted the first stage of the work put in hand. This statue has shown that skill in bronze-founding has perished, since Nero was quite ready to provide gold and silver, and also Zenodorus was counted inferior to none of the artists of old in his knowledge of modelling and chasing. [47] When he was making the statue for the Arverni, when the governor of the province was Dubius Avitus, he produced facsimiles of two chased cups, the handiwork of Calamis, which Germanicus Caesar had prized highly and had presented to his tutor Cassius Salanus, Avitus's uncle; the copies were so skilfully made that there was scarcely any difference in artistry between them and the originals. The greater was the eminence of Zenodorus, the more we realize how the art of working bronze has deteriorated.
[48] Owners of the figurines called Corinthian are usually so enamoured of them that they carry them about with them; for instance the orator Hortensius was never parted from the sphinx which he had got out of Verres when on trial; this explains Cicero's retort when Hortensius in the course of an altercation at the trial in question said he was not good at riddles. 'You ought to be,' said Cicero, 'as you keep a figurine in your pocket.' The emperor Nero also used to carry about with him an Amazon which we shall describe later { 34.82 }, and a little before Nero, the ex-consul Gaius Cestius used to go about with a sphinx, which he had with him even on the battlefield. It is also said that the tent of Alexander the Great was regularly erected with four statues as tent-poles, two of which have now been dedicated to stand in front of the temple of Mars the Avenger and two in front of the Regia.
{19.} L [49] An almost innumerable multitude of artists have been rendered famous by statues and figures of smaller size; but before them all stands the Athenian Pheidias, celebrated for the Statue of Olympian Zeus, which in fact was made of ivory and gold, although he also made figures of bronze. He flourished in the 83rd Olympiad {448-445 BC}, about the 300th year of our city, at which same period his rivals were Alcamenes, Critias, Nesiotes and Hegias; and later, in the 87th Olympiad {432-429 BC} there were Hagelades, Callon and Gorgias of Laconia, and again in the 90th Olympiad {420-417 BC} Polycleitus, Phradmon, Myron, Pythagoras, Scopas and Perellus. [50] Of these Polycleitus had as pupils Argius, Asopodorus, Alexis, Aristides, Phrynon, Dinon, Athenodorus, and Demeas of Cleitor; and Myron had Lycius. In the 95th Olympiad {400-397 BC} flourished Naucydes, Dinomenes, Canachus and Patroclus; and in the 102nd {372-369 BC} Polycles, Cephisodotus, Leochares and Hypatodorus; in the 104th {364-361 BC} Praxiteles and Euphranor; in the 107th {352-349 BC} Aetion and Therimachus. [51] Lysippus was in the 113th {328-325 BC}, the period of Alexander the Great, and likewise his brother Lysistratus, Sthennis, Euphron, Sophocles, Sostratus, Ion and Silanion - a remarkable fact in the case of the last named being that he became famous without having had any teacher; he himself had Zeuxiades as his pupil - and in the 121st {296-293 BC} Eutychides, Euthycrates, Laippus, Cephisodotus, Timarchus and Pyromachus. [52] After that the art languished, and it revived again in the 156th Olympiad {156-153 BC}, when there were the following, far inferior it is true to those mentioned above, but nevertheless artists of repute: Antaeus, Callistratus, Polycles of Athens, Callixenus, Pythocles, Pythias and Timocles.
[53] After thus defining the periods of the most famous artists, I will hastily run through those of outstanding distinction, throwing in the rest of the throng here and there under various heads. The most celebrated have also come into competition with each other, although born at different periods, because they had made statues of Amazons; when these were dedicated in the Temple of Artemis of Ephesus, it was agreed that the best one should be selected by the vote of the artists themselves who were present; and it then became evident that the best was the one which all the artists judged to be the next best after their own: this is the Amazon by Polycleitus, while next to it came that of Pheidias, third Cresilas's, fourth Cydon's and fifth Phradmon's.
[54] Pheidias, besides the Olympian Zeus, which nobody has ever rivalled, executed in ivory and gold the statue of Athena that stands erect in the Parthenon at Athens, and in bronze, besides the Amazon mentioned above, an Athena of such exquisite beauty that it has been surnamed the 'Fair.' He also made the Lady with the Keys, and another Athena which Aemilius Paulus dedicated in Rome at the temple of Today's Fortune, and likewise a work consisting of two statues wearing cloaks which Catulus erected in the same temple, and another work, a colossal statue undraped; and Pheidias is deservedly deemed to have first revealed the capabilities and indicated the methods of statuary.
[55] Polycleitus of Sicyon, a pupil of Hagelades, made a statue of the Diadumenos or 'Binding his Hair' - a youth, but soft-looking - famous for having cost 100 talents, and also the Doryphoros or 'Carrying a Spear' - a boy, but manly-looking. He also made what artists call a Canon or 'Model Statue', as they draw their artistic outlines from it as from a sort of standard; and he alone of mankind is deemed by means of one work of art to have created the art itself! He also made the statue of the Apoxyomenos ('Man using a Body-scraper') and, in the nude, the Man Attacking with Spear, and the Two Boys Playing Dice, likewise in the nude, known by the Greek name of Astragalizontes and now standing in the forecourt of the Emperor Titus - this is generally considered to be the most perfect work of art in existence - and likewise the Hermes that was once at Lysimachea; [56] Heracles; the Leader Donning his Armour, which is at Rome; and Artemon, called the Man in the Litter. Polycleitus is deemed to have perfected this science of statuary and to have refined the art of carving sculpture, just as Pheidias is considered to have revealed it. A discovery that was entirely his own is the art of making statues throwing their weight on one leg, although Varro says these figures are of a square build and almost all made on one model.
[57] Myron, who was born at Eleutherae, was himself also a pupil of Hagelades; he was specially famous for his statue of a heifer, celebrated in some well-known sets of verses - inasmuch as most men owe their reputation more to someone else's talent than to their own. His other works include Ladas and a Discobolus or 'Man Throwing a Discus', and Perseus, and The Sawyers, and The Satyr Marvelling at the Flute and Athena, Competitors in the Pentathlon at Delphi, the All-round Fighters, the Heracles now in the house of Pompeius the Great at the Circus Maximus. Erinna in her poems indicates that he even made a memorial statue of a tree-cricket and a locust. [58] He also made an Apollo which was taken from the people of Ephesus by Antonius the triumvir but restored to them by the deified Augustus in obedience to a warning given him in a dream. Myron is the first sculptor who appears to have enlarged the scope of realism, having more rhythms in his art than Polycleitus and being more careful in his proportions. Yet he himself so far as surface configuration goes attained great finish, but he does not seem to have given expression to the feelings of the mind, and moreover he has not treated the hair and the pubes with any more accuracy than had been achieved by the rude work of olden days.
[59] Myron was defeated by the Italian Pythagoras of Rhegium with his Pancratiast which stands at Delphi, with which he also defeated Leontiscus; Pythagoras also did the runner Astylos which is on show at Olympia; and, in the same place, the Libyan as a boy holding a tablet; and the nude Man Holding Apples, while at Syracuse there is his Lame Man, which actually makes people looking at it feel a pain from his ulcer in their own leg, and also Apollo shooting the Python with his Arrows, a Citharode, that has the Greek name of The Honest Man given it because when Alexander took Thebes a fugitive successfully hid in its bosom a sum of gold. Pythagoras of Rhegium was the first sculptor to show the sinews and veins, and to represent the hair more carefully.
[60] There was also another Pythagoras, a Samian, who began as a painter; his seven nude statues now at the temple of Today's Fortune { Fortuna Huiusce Diei } and one of an old man are highly spoken of. He is recorded to have resembled the above mentioned Pythagoras so closely that even their features were indistinguishable; but we are told that Sostratus was a pupil of Pythagoras of Rhegium and a son of this Pythagoras' sister.
[61] Lysippus of Sicyon is said by Duris not to have been the pupil of anybody, but to have been originally a copper-smith and to have first got the idea of venturing on sculpture from the reply given by the painter Eupompus when asked which of his predecessors he took for his model; he pointed to a crowd of people and said that it was Nature herself, not an artist, whom one ought to imitate. [62] Lysippus as we have said { 34.37 } was a most prolific artist and made more statues than any other sculptor, among them the Apoxyomenos {'Man using a Body-scraper'}, which Marcus Agrippa gave to be set up in front of his Warm Baths and of which the emperor Tiberius was remarkably fond. Tiberius, although at the beginning of his principate he kept some control of himself, in this case could not resist the temptation, and had the statue removed to his bedchamber, putting another one in its place at the baths; but the public were so obstinately opposed to this that they raised an outcry at the theatre, shouting 'Give us back the Apoxyomenos', and the Emperor, although he had fallen quite in love with the statue, had to restore it. [63] Lysippus is also famous for his Tipsy Girl playing the Flute, and his Hounds and Huntsmen in Pursuit of Game, but most of all for his Chariot with the Sun belonging to Rhodes. He also executed a series of statues of Alexander the Great, beginning with one in Alexander's boyhood. The emperor Nero was so delighted by this statue of the young Alexander that he ordered it to be gilt; but this addition to its money value so diminished its artistic attraction that afterwards the gold was removed, and in that condition the statue was considered yet more valuable, even though still retaining scars from the work done on it and incisions in which the gold had been fastened. [64] The same sculptor did Alexander the Great's friend Hephaestion, a statue which some people ascribe to Polycleitus, although his date is about a hundred years earlier; and also Alexander's Hunt, dedicated at Delphi, a Satyr now at Athens, and Alexander's Squadron of Horse, in which the sculptor introduced portraits of Alexander's friends consummately lifelike in every case. After the conquest of Macedonia {148 BC} this was removed to Rome by Metellus; he also executed Four-horse Chariots of various kinds. [65] Lysippus is said to have contributed greatly to the art of bronze statuary by representing the details of the hair and by making his heads smaller than the old sculptors used to do, and his bodies more slender and firm, to give his statues the appearance of greater height. He scrupulously preserved the quality of 'symmetry' (for which there is no word in Latin) by the new and hitherto untried method of modifying the squareness of the figure of the old sculptors, and he used commonly to say that whereas his predecessors had made men as they really were, he made them as they appeared to be. A peculiarity of this sculptor's work seems to be the minute finish maintained in even the smallest details.
[66] Lysippus left three sons who were his pupils, the celebrated artists Laippus, Boëdas and Euthycrates, the last pre-eminent, although he copied the harmony rather than the elegance of his father, preferring to win favour in the severely correct more than in the agreeable style. Accordingly his Heracles, at Delphi, and his Alexander Hunting, at Thespiae, his group of Thespiades, and his Cavalry in Action are works of extreme finish, and so are his statue of Trophonius at the oracular shrine of that deity, a number of Four-horse Chariots, a Horse with Baskets and a Pack of Hounds. [67] Moreover Tisicrates, another native of Sicyon, was a pupil of Euthycrates, but closer to the school of Lysippus - indeed many of his statues cannot be distinguished from Lysippus's work, for instance his Old Man of Thebes, his King Demetrius {Poliorcetes}, and his Peucestas, the man who saved the life of Alexander the Great and so deserved the honour of this commemoration.
[68] Artists who have composed treatises recording these matters speak with marvellously high praise of Telephanes of Phocis, who is otherwise unknown, since he lived at . . . in Thessaly where his works have remained in concealment, although these writers' own testimony puts him on a level with Polycleitus, Myron and Pythagoras. They praise his Larisa, his Spintharus the Pentathlete, and his Apollo. Others however are of opinion that the cause of his lack of celebrity is not the reason mentioned but his having devoted himself entirely to the studios established by king Xerxes and king Darius.
[69] Praxiteles although more successful and therefore more celebrated in marble, nevertheless also made some very beautiful works in bronze: the Rape of Persephone, also The Girl Spinning and a Father Liber or Dionysus, with a figure of Drunkenness and also the famous Satyr, known by the Greek title Periboëtos meaning 'Celebrated,' and the statues that used to be in front of the temple of Felicitas {"Happiness "}, and the Venus, which was destroyed by fire when the temple of that goddess was burnt down in the reign of Claudius, and which rivalled the famous Aphrodite, in marble, that is known all over the world; [70] also A Woman Bestowing a Wreath, A Woman Putting a Bracelet on her Arm, Autumn, Harmodius and Aristogeiton who slew the tyrant - the last piece carried off by Xerxes king of the Persians but restored to the Athenians by Alexander the Great after his conquest of Persis. Praxiteles also made a youthful Apollo which the Greeks call Sauroctonos {'Lizard-Slayer'} because he is waiting with an arrow for a lizard creeping towards him. Also two of his statues expressing opposite emotions are admired, his Matron Weeping and his Merry Courtesan. The latter is believed to have been Phryne and connoisseurs detect in the figure the artist's love of her and the reward promised him by the expression on the courtesan's face. [71] The kindness also of Praxiteles is represented in sculpture, as in the Chariot and Four of Calamis he contributed the charioteer, in order that the sculptor might not be thought to have failed in the human figure although more successful in representing horses. Calamis himself also made other chariots, some with four horses and some with two, and in executing the horses he is invariably unrivalled: but - that it may not be supposed that he was inferior in his human figures - his Alcmena is as famous as that of any other sculptor.
[72] Alcamenes a pupil of Pheidias made marble figures, and also in bronze a Pentathlete, known by the Greek term Encrinomemos {"Highly Commended"}, but Polycleitus's pupil Aristides made four-horse and pair-horse chariots. Amphicrates is praised for his Leaena; she was a harlot, admitted to the friendship of Harmodius and Aristogeiton because of her skill as a harpist, who though put to the torture by the tyrants till she died refused to betray their plot to assassinate them. Consequently the Athenians wishing to do her honour and yet unwilling to have made a harlot famous, had a statue made of a lioness, as that was her name, and to indicate the reason for the honour paid her instructed the artist to represent the animal as having no tongue.
[73] Bryaxis made statues of Asclepius and Seleucus, Boëdas a Man Praying, Baton an Apollo and a Hera, both now in the Temple of Concord at Rome. [74] Cresilas did a Man Fainting from Wounds, the expression of which indicates how little life remains, and the Olympian Pericles, a figure worthy of its title; indeed it is a marvellous thing about the art of sculpture that it has added celebrity to men already celebrated. Cephisodorus made the wonderful Athena at the harbour of Athens and the almost unrivalled altar at the temple of Zeus the Deliverer at the same harbour, [75] Canachus the naked Apollo, surnamed Philesius, at Didyma, made of bronze compounded at Aegina; and with it he made a stag so lightly poised in its footprints as to allow of a thread being passed underneath its feet, the 'heel' and the 'toes' holding to the base with alternate contacts, the whole hoof being so jointed in either part that it springs back from the impact. He also made a Boys Riding on Racehorses. Chaereas did Alexander the Great and his father Philippus, Ctesilaus a Man with a Spear and a Wounded Amazon, [76] Demetrius Lysimache who was a priestess of Athena for 64 years, and also the Athena called the Murmuring Athena - the dragons on her Gorgon's head sound with a tinkling note when a harp is struck; he likewise did the mounted statue of Simon who wrote the first treatise on horsemanship. Daedalus (also famous as a modeller in clay) made Two Boys using a Body-Scraper, and Dinomenes did a Protesilaus and the wrestler Pythodemus. [77] The statue of Alexander Paris is by Euphranor; it is praised because it conveys all the characteristics of Paris in combination - the judge of the goddesses, the lover of Helen and yet the slayer of Achilles. The Athena, called at Rome the Catuliana, which stands below the Capitol and was dedicated by Quintus Lutatius Catulus {78 BC}, is Euphranor's, and so is the figure of Success, holding a dish in the right hand and in the left an ear of corn and some poppies, and also in the temple of Concord a Leto as Nursing Mother, with the infants Apollo and Artemis in her arms. [78] He also made four-horse and two-horse chariots, and an exceptionally beautiful Lady with the Keys, and two colossal statues, one of Virtue and one of Greece, a Woman Wondering and Worshipping, and also an Alexander and a Philippus in four-horse chariots. Eutychides did a Eurotas, in which it has frequently been said that the work of the artist seems clearer than the water of the real river. The Athena and the King Pyrrhus of Hegias are praised, and his Boys Riding on Racehorses, and his Castor and Pollux that stand before the temple of Jupiter the Thunderer; and so are Hagesias's Heracles in our colony of Parium, and Isidotus's Man Sacrificing an Ox. [79] Lycius who was a pupil of Myron did a Boy Blowing a Dying Fire that is worthy of his instructor, also a group of the Argonauts; Leochares an Eagle carrying off Ganymedes in which the bird is aware of what his burden is and for whom he is carrying it, and is careful not to let his claws hurt the boy even through his clothes, and Autolycus Winner of the pancratium, being also the athlete in whose honour Xenophon wrote his Symposium, and the famous Zeus the Thunderer now on the Capitol, of quite unrivalled merit, also an Apollo crowned with a Diadem; also Lyciscus, the Slave-dealer, and a Boy, with the crafty cringing look of a household slave. Lycius also did a Boy Burning Perfumes. [80] There is a Bull-calf by Menaechmus, on which a man is pressing his knee as he bends its neck back; Menaechmus has written a treatise about his own work. The reputation of Naucydes rests on his Hermes and Discobolus {'Man throwing a Disc'} and Man Sacrificing a Ram, that of Naucerus on his Wrestler Winded, that of Niceratus on his Asclepius and his Hygieia {"Goddess of Health"}, which are in the Temple of Concord at Rome. Pyromachus has an Alcibiades Driving a Chariot and Four; Polycles made a famous Hermaphrodite, Pyrrhus, a Hygieia and Athena, [81] Phanis, who was a pupil of Lysippus, a Woman Sacrificing. Styppax of Cyprus is known for a single statue, his Man Cooking Tripe, which represented a domestic slave of the Olympian Pericles roasting the internal organs and puffing out his cheeks as he kindles the fire with his breath; Silanion cast a metal figure of Apollodorus, who was himself a modeller, and indeed one of quite unrivalled devotion to the art and a severe critic of his own work, who often broke his statues in pieces after he had finished them, his intense passion for his art making him unable to be satisfied, and consequently he was given the surname of the Madman - [82] this quality he brought out in his statue, the Madman, which represented in bronze not a human being but anger personified. Silanion also made a famous Achilles, and also a Superintendent Exercising Athletes; Strongylion made an Amazon, which from the remarkable beauty of the legs is called the Eucnemon, and which consequently the emperor Nero caused to be carried in his retinue on his journeys. The same sculptor made the figure rendered famous by Brutus under the name of Brutus's Boy because it represented a favourite of the hero of the battles at Philippi. [83] Theodorus, who constructed the Labyrinth at Samos, cast a statue of himself in bronze. Besides its remarkable celebrity as a likeness, it is famous for its very minute workmanship; the right hand holds a file, and three fingers of the left hand originally held a little model of a chariot and four, but this has been taken away to Praeneste as a marvel of smallness: if the team were reproduced in a picture with the chariot and the charioteer, the model of a fly, which was made by the artist at the same time, would cover it with its wings. Xenocrates, who was a pupil of Tisicrates, or by other accounts of Euthycrates, surpassed both of the last mentioned in the number of his statues; and he also wrote books about his art.
[84] Several artists have represented the battles of Attalus and Eumenes against the Gauls, Isigonus, Pyromachus, Stratonicus and Antigonus, who wrote books about his art. Boethus did a Child Strangling a Goose by hugging it, although he is better in silver. And among the list of works I have referred to all the most celebrated have now been dedicated by the emperor Vespasian in the temple of Peace and his other public buildings; they had been looted by Nero, who conveyed them all to Rome and arranged them in the sitting-rooms of his Golden House.
[85] Besides these, artists on the same level of merit but of no outstanding excellence in any of their works are: Ariston, who often also practised chasing silver, Callides, Ctesias, Cantharus of Sicyon, Dionysius, Diodorus the pupil of Critias, Deliades, Euphorion, Eunicus and Hecataeus the silver chasers, Lesbocles, Prodorus, Pythodieus, Polygnotus, who was also one of the most famous among painters, similarly Stratonicus among chasers, and Critias's pupil Scymnus.
[86] I will now run through the artists who have made works of the same class, such as Apollodorus, Androbulus and Asclepiodorus, Aleuas, who have done philosophers, and Apellas also women donning their ornaments, and Antignotus also Man using a Body-scraper and the Tyrannicides, above-mentioned, Antimachus, Athenodorus who made splendid figures of women, Aristodemus who also did Wrestlers, and Chariot and Pair with Driver, figures of philosophers, of old women, and King Seleucus; Aristodemus's Man holding Spear is also popular. [87] There were two artists named Cephisodotus; the Hermes Nursing Father Liber or Dionysus when an Infant belongs to the elder, who also did a Man Haranguing with Hand Uplifted - whom it represents is uncertain. The later Cephisodotus did philosophers. Colotes who had co-operated with Pheidias in the Statue of Olympian Zeus made statues of philosophers, as also did Cleon and Cenchramis and Callicles and Cepis; Chalcosthenes also did actors in comedy and athletes; Daippus a Man using a Scraper; Daiphron, Damocritus and Daemon statues of philosophers. [88] Epigonus, who copied others in almost all the subjects already mentioned, took the lead with his Trumpet-player and his Weeping Infant pitifully caressing its Murdered Mother. Praise is given to Eubulus's Woman in Admiration and to Eubulides' Person Counting on the Fingers. Micon is noticed for his athletes and Menogenes for his chariots and four. Niceratus, who likewise attempted all the subjects employed by any other sculptor, did a statue of Alcibiades and one of his mother Demarate, represented as performing a sacrifice by torch-light. [89] Tisicrates did a pair-horse chariot in which Piston afterwards placed a woman; the latter also made an Ares and a Hermes now in the temple of Concord at Rome. No one should praise Perillus, who was more cruel than the tyrant Phalaris, for whom he made a bull, guaranteeing that if a man were shut up inside it and a fire lit underneath the man would do the bellowing; and he was himself the first to experience this torture - a cruelty more just than the one he proposed. Such were the depths to which the sculptor had diverted this most humane of arts from images of gods and men! All the founders of the art had only toiled so that it should be employed for making implements of torture! Consequently this sculptor's works are preserved for one purpose only, so that whoever sees them may hate the hands that made them. [90] Sthennis did a Demeter, a Zeus and an Athena that are in the Temple of Concord at Rome, and also Weeping Matrons and Matrons at Prayer and Offering a Sacrifice. Simon made a Dog and an Archer, the famous engraver Stratonicus some philosophers and each of these artists made figures of hostesses of inns. [91] The following have made figures of athletes, armed men, hunters and men offering sacrifice: Baton, Eucheir, Glaucides, Heliodorus, Hicanus, Iophon, Lyson, Leon, Menodorus, Myagrus, Polycrates, Polyidus, Pythocritus, Protogenes (who was also, as we shall say later { 35.101 }, one of the most famous painters), Patrocles, Pollis and Posidonius (the last also a distinguished silver chaser, native of Ephesus), Periclymenus, Philon, Symenus, Timotheus, Theomnestus, Timarchides, Timon, Tisias, Thrason.
[92] But of all Callimachus is the most remarkable, because of the surname attached to him: he was always unfairly critical of his own work, and was an artist of never-ending assiduity, and consequently he was called the Niggler, and is a notable warning of the duty of observing moderation even in taking pains. To him belongs the Laconian Women Dancing, a very finished work but one in which assiduity has destroyed all charm. Callimachus is reported to have also been a painter. Cato in his expedition to Cyprus {58-56 BC} sold all the statues found there except one of Zenon; it was not the value of the bronze nor the artistic merit that attracted him, but its being the statue of a philosopher: I mention this by the way, to introduce this distinguished instance also.
[93] In mentioning statues - there is also one we must not pass over in spite of the sculptor's not being known - the figure, next to the Rostra, of Hercules in the Tunic, the only one in Rome that shows him in that dress; the countenance is stern and the statue expresses the feeling of the final agony of the tunic. On this statue there are three inscriptions, one stating that it had been part of the booty taken by the general Lucius Lucullus, and another saying that it was dedicated, in pursuance of a decree of the Senate, by Lucullus's son while still a ward, and the third, that Titus Septimius Sabinus as curule aedile had caused it to be restored to the public from private ownership. So many were the rivalries connected with this statue and so highly was it valued.
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