Books: The Old Roman World

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[Sidenote: Changes made by the Romans.]

[Sidenote: Invention of the arch.]

[Sidenote: Uses of the arch.]

The Romans invented no new principle in architecture, except the arch,
which was not known to the Greeks, and carried out by them to greater
perfection than by the Romans; but this, for simplicity, harmony, and
beauty, has never been surpassed in any age, or by any nation. The
Romans were a practical and utilitarian people, and needed for their
various structures greater economy of material than large blocks of
stone, especially for such as were carried to great altitudes. The arch
supplied this want, and is perhaps the greatest invention ever made in
architecture. No instance of its adoption occurs in the construction of
Greek edifices, before Greece became a part of the Roman Empire. Its
application dates back to the Cloaca Maxima, and may have been of
Etrurian invention. It was not known to Egyptians, or Persians, or
Indians, or Greeks. Some maintain that Archimedes of Sicily was the
inventor, but to whomsoever the glory of the invention is due, it is
certain that the Romans were the first to make a practical application
of its wonderful qualities. It enabled them to rear vast edifices into
the air with the humblest materials, to build bridges, aqueducts,
sewers, amphitheatres, and triumphal arches, as well as temples and
palaces; its merits have never been lost sight of by succeeding
generations, and it is at the foundation of the magnificent Gothic
cathedrals of the Middle Ages. Its application extends to domes and
cupolas, to arched floors and corridors and roofs, and to various other
parts of buildings where economy of material and labor is desired. It
was applied extensively to doorways and windows, and is an ornament as
well as a utility. The most imposing forms of Roman architecture may be
traced to a knowledge of the properties of the arch, and as brick was
more extensively used than any other material, the arch was invaluable.
The imperial palace on Mount Palatine, the Pantheon, except its portico
and internal columns, the temples of Peace, of Venus and Rome, and of
Minerva Medica, were of brick. So were the great baths of Titus,
Caracalla, and Diocletian, the villa of Adrian, the city walls, the
villa of Maecenas at Tivoli, and most of the palaces of the nobility;
although, like many of the temples, they were faced with stone. The
Colosseum was of travertine faced with marble. It was the custom to
stucco the surface of the walls, as favorable to decorations. In
consequence of this invention, the Romans erected a greater variety of
fine structures than either the Greeks or Egyptians, whose public
edifices were chiefly confined to temples. The arch entered into almost
every structure, public or private, and superseded the use of long stone
beams, which were necessary in the Grecian temples, as also of wooden
timbers, in the use of which the Romans were not skilled, and which do
not really pertain to the art of architecture. An imposing building must
always be constructed of stone or brick. The arch also enabled the
Romans to economize in the use of costly marbles, of which they were
very fond, as well as of other stones. Some of the finest columns were
made of Egyptian granite, very highly polished.

The extensive application of the arch doubtless led to the deterioration
of the Grecian architecture, since it blended columns with arcades, and
thus impaired the harmony which so peculiarly marked the temples of
Athens and Corinth. And as taste became vitiated with the decline of the
Empire, monstrous combinations took place, which were a great fall from
the simplicity of the Parthenon, and the interior of the Pantheon.

[Sidenote: Magnificence of Roman architecture.]

But whatever defects marked the age of Diocletian and Constantine, it
can never be questioned that the Romans carried architecture to a
perfection rarely attained in our times. They may not have equaled the
severe simplicity of their teachers, the Greeks, but they surpassed them
in the richness or their decorations, and in all buildings designed for
utility, especially in private houses and baths and theatres.

[Sidenote: The effect of columns in architecture.]

The Romans do not seem to have used other than semicircular arches. The
Gothic, or Pointed, or Christian architecture, as it has been variously
called, was the creation of the Middle Ages, and arose nearly
simultaneously in Europe after the first Crusade, so that it would seem
to be of Eastern origin. But it was a graft on the old Roman arch,--in
the shape of an ellipse rather than a circle. Aside from this invention,
to which we are indebted for the most beautiful ecclesiastical
structures ever erected, we owe every thing in architecture to the
Greeks and Romans. We have found out no new principles which were not
equally known to Vitruvius. No one man was the inventor or creator of
the wonderful structures which ornamented the cities of the ancient
world. We have the names of great architects, who reared various and
faultless models, but they all worked upon the same principles. And
these can never be subverted. So that in architecture the ancients are
our schoolmasters, whose genius we revere the more we are acquainted
with their works. What more beautiful than one of those grand temples
which the heathen but cultivated Greeks erected to the worship of their
unknown gods: the graduated and receding stylobate as a base for the
fluted columns, rising at regular distances, in all their severe
proportion and matchless harmony, with their richly carved capitals,
supporting an entablature of heavy stones, most elaborately moulded and
ornamented with the figures of plants and animals, and rising above
this, on the ends of the temple, or over a portico several columns deep,
the pediment, covered by chiseled cornices, with still richer ornaments
rising from the apices and at the feet; all carved in white marble, and
then spread over an area larger than any modern churches, making a
forest of columns to bear aloft those ponderous beams of stone, without
any thing tending to break the continuity of horizontal lines, by which
the harmony and simplicity of the whole are seen. So accurately squared
and nicely adjusted were the stones and pillars of which these temples
were built, that there was scarcely need of even cement. Without noise
or confusion or sound of hammers did those temples rise, since all their
parts were cut and carved in the distant quarries, and with mathematical
precision. And within the cella, nearly concealed by the surrounding
columns, were the statues of the gods, and the altars on which incense
was offered, or sacrifices made. In every part, interior and exterior,
do we see a matchless proportion and beauty, whether in the shaft, or
the capital, or the frieze, or the pilaster, or the pediment, or the
cornices, or even the mouldings--everywhere grace and harmony, which
grow upon the mind the more they are contemplated. The greatest evidence
of the matchless creative genius displayed in those architectural
wonders is that, after two thousand years, and with all the inventions
of Roman and modern artists, no improvement can be made, and those
edifices which are the admiration of our own times are deemed beautiful
as they approximate the ancient models which will forever remain objects
of imitation, No science can make two and two other than four. No art
can make a Doric temple different from the Parthenon without departing
from the settled principles of beauty and proportion which all ages have
endorsed. Such were the Greeks and Romans in an art which is one of the
greatest indices of material civilization, and which by them was derived
from geometrical forms, or the imitation of Nature.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: Perfection of Grecian sculpture.]

The genius displayed by the ancients in sculpture, is even more
remarkable than in architecture. It was carried to perfection, however,
only by the Greeks. But they did not originate the art, since we read of
sculptured images from the remotest antiquity. The earliest names of
sculptors are furnished by the Old Testament. Assyria and Egypt are full
of relics to show how early this art was cultivated. It was not carried
to perfection as early, probably, as architecture; but rude images of
gods, carved in wood, are as old as the history of idolatry. The history
of sculpture is in fact identified with that of idols. It was from
Phoenicia that Solomon obtained the workmen for the decoration of his
Temple. But the Egyptians were probably the first who made considerable
advances in the execution of statues. They are rude, simple, uniform,
without beauty or grace, but colossal and grand. Nearly two thousand
years before Christ, the walls of Thebes were ornamented with sculptured
figures, even as the gates of Babylon were of sculptured bronze. The
dimensions of Egyptian colossal figures surpass those of any other
nation. The sitting figures of Memnon at Thebes are fifty feet in
height, and the Sphinx is twenty-five, and these are of granite. The
number of colossal statues was almost incredible. The sculptures found
among the ruins of Carnac must have been made nearly four thousand years
ago. [Footnote: Wilkinson's _Ancient Egyptians_.] They exhibit
great simplicity of design, but without much variety of expression. They
are generally carved from the hardest stones, and finished so nicely
that we infer that the Egyptians were acquainted with the art of
hardening metals to a degree not known in our times. But we see no ideal
grandeur among any of the remains of Egyptian sculpture. However
symmetrical or colossal, there is no expression, no trace of emotion, no
intellectual force. Every thing is calm, impassive, imperturbable. It
was not until sculpture came into the hands of the Greeks that any
remarkable excellence was reached. But the progress of development was
slow. The earliest carvings were rude wooden images of the gods, and
more than a thousand years elapsed before the great masters were
produced which marked the age of Pericles.

It is not my object to give a history of the development of the plastic
art, but to show the great excellence it attained in the hands of
immortal sculptors.

[Sidenote: Admiration for sculpture among the Greeks.]

[Sidenote: High estimation of sculpture among the Greeks.]

The Greeks had an intuitive perception of the beautiful, and to this
great national trait we ascribe the wonderful progress which sculpture
made. Nature was most carefully studied, and that which was most
beautiful in Nature became the object of imitation. They ever attained
to an ideal excellence, since they combined in a single statue what
could not be found in a single individual, as Zeuxis is said to have
studied the beautiful forms of seven virgins of Crotona in order to
paint his famous picture of Venus. Great as was the beauty of Thryne, or
Aspasia, or Lais, yet no one of them could have served for a perfect
model. And it required a great sensibility to beauty in order to select
and idealize what was most perfect in the human figure. Beauty was
adored in Greece, and every means were used to perfect it, especially
beauty of form, which is the characteristic excellence of Grecian
statuary. The gymnasia were universally frequented, and the great prizes
of the games, bestowed for feats of strength and agility, were regarded
as the highest honors which men could receive--the subject of the
poet's ode and the people's admiration. Statues of the victors
perpetuated their fame and improved the sculptor's art. From the study
of these statues were produced those great creations which all
subsequent ages have admired. And from the application of the principles
seen in these forms we owe the perpetuation of the ideas of grandeur and
beauty such as no other people have ever discovered and scarcely
appreciated. The sculpture of the human figure became a noble object of
ambition, and was most munificently rewarded. Great artists arose, whose
works adorned the temples of Greece, so long as she preserved her
independence; and when it was lost, their priceless productions were
scattered over Asia and Europe. The Romans especially seized what was
most prized, whether or not they could tell what was most perfect.
Greece lived in her marble statues more than in her government or laws.
And when we remember the estimation in which sculpture was held, the
great prices paid for masterpieces, the care and attention with which
they were guarded and preserved, and the innumerable works which were
produced, filling all the public buildings, especially consecrated
places, and even open spaces, and the houses of the rich and great,--
calling from all classes admiration and praise,--it is improbable that
so great perfection will ever be reached again in those figures which
are designed to represent beauty of form. Even the comparatively few
statues which have survived the wars and violence of two thousand years,
convince us that the moderns can only imitate. They can produce no
creations which were not surpassed by Athenian artists. "No mechanical
copying of Greek statues, however skillful the copyist, can ever secure
for modern sculpture the same noble and effective character it possessed
among the Greeks, for the simple reason that the imitation, close as may
be the resemblance, is but the result of the eye and hand, while the
original is the expression of a true and deeply felt sentiment. Art was
not sustained by the patronage of a few who affect to have what is
called _taste_. In Greece, the artist, having a common feeling for
the beautiful with his countrymen, produced his works for the public,
which were erected in places of honor and dedicated in temples of the
gods." [Footnote: _Encyclopedia Britannica_, "Sculpture," R. W. T.]

[Sidenote: Phidias and his contemporaries.]

[Sidenote: The statue of Zeus by Phidias.]

But it was not until the Persian wars awakened in Greece the slumbering
consciousness of national power, and Athens became the central point of
Grecian civilization, that sculpture, like architecture and painting,
reached its culminating point of excellence, under Phidias and his
contemporaries. Great artists, however, had previously made themselves
famous, like Miron, Polycletus, and Ageladas; but the great riches which
flowed into Athens at this time gave a peculiar stimulus to art,
especially under the encouragement of such a ruler as Pericles, whose
age was the golden era of Grecian history. Pheidias or Phidias was to
sculpture what Aeschylus was to tragic poetry, sublime and grand. He was
born four hundred and eighty-four years before Christ, and was the pupil
of Ageladas. He stands at the head of the ancient sculptors, not from
what _we_ know of him, for his masterpieces have perished, but from
the estimation in which he was held by the greatest critics of
antiquity. It was to him that Pericles intrusted the adornment of the
Parthenon, and the numerous and beautiful sculptures of the frieze and
the pediment were the work of artists whom he directed. _His_ great
work in that wonderful edifice was the statue of the goddess Minerva
herself, made of gold and ivory, forty feet in height, standing
victorious with a spear in her left hand and an image of victory in her
right; girded with the aegis, with helmet on her head, and her shield
resting by her side. The cost of this statue may be estimated when the
gold alone of which it was composed was valued at forty-four talents.
[Footnote: This sum was equal to $500,000 of our money, an immense sum
in that age. Some critics suppose that this statue was overloaded with
ornament, but all antiquity was unanimous in its admiration. The
exactness and finish of detail were as remarkable as the grandeur of the
proportions.] Another of his famous works was a colossal bronze statue
of Athena Promachus, sixty feet in height, on the Acropolis, between the
Propylaea and the Parthenon. But both of these yielded to the colossal
statue of Zeus in his great temple at Olympia, represented in a sitting
posture, forty feet high, on a pedestal of twenty. In this, his greatest
work, the artist sought to embody the idea of majesty and repose,--of a
supreme deity no longer engaged in war with Titans and Giants, but
enthroned as a conqueror, ruling with a nod the subject world, and
giving his blessing to those victories which gave glory to the Greeks.
[Footnote: The god was seated on a throne. Ebony, gold, ivory, and
precious stones formed, with a multitude of sculptured and painted
figures, the wonderful composition of this throne.] So famous was this
statue, which was regarded as the masterpiece of Grecian art, that it
was considered a calamity to die without seeing it; and this served for
a model for all subsequent representations of majesty and power in
repose among the ancients. It was removed to Constantinople by
Theodosius I., and was destroyed by fire in the year 475. Phidias
executed various other famous works, which have perished; but even those
that were executed under his superintendence, that have come down to our
times, like the statues which ornamented the pediment of the Parthenon,
are among the finest specimens of art which exist, and exhibit the most
graceful and appropriate forms which could have been selected, uniting
grandeur with simplicity, and beauty with accuracy of anatomical
structure. His distinguishing excellence was ideal beauty, and that of
the sublimest order. [Footnote: Muller, _De Phidiae Vita_.]

[Sidenote: Colossal statues of ivory and gold.]

Of all the wonders and mysteries of ancient art, the colossal statues of
ivory and gold were perhaps the most remarkable, and the difficulty of
executing them has been set forth by the ablest of modern critics, like
Winkelmann, Heyne, and De Quincy. "The grandeur of their dimensions, the
perfection of their workmanship, the richness of their materials; their
majesty, beauty, and ideal truth; the splendor of the architecture and
pictorial decoration with which they were associated, all conspired to
impress the beholder with wonder and awe, and induce a belief of the
actual presence of the god."

[Sidenote: The school of Praxiteles.]

After the Peloponnesian War, a new school of art arose in Athens, which
appealed more to the passions. Of this school was Praxiteles, who aimed
to please, without seeking to elevate or instruct. No one has probably
ever surpassed him in execution. He wrought in bronze and marble, and
was one of the artists who adorned the Mausoleum of Artemisia. Without
attempting the sublime impersonation of the deity, in which Phidias
excelled, he was unsurpassed in the softer graces and beauties of the
human form, especially in female figures. His most famous work was an
undraped statue of Venus, for his native town of Cnidus, which was so
remarkable that people flocked from all parts of Greece to see it. He
did not aim at ideal majesty so much as ideal gracefulness, and his
works were imitated from the most beautiful living models, and hence
expressed only the ideal of sensual charms. It is probable that the
Venus de Medici of Cleomenes was a mere copy of the Aphrodite of
Praxiteles, which was so highly extolled by the ancient authors. It was
of Parian marble, and modeled from the celebrated Phryne. His statues of
Dionysus also expressed the most consummate physical beauty,
representing the god as a beautiful youth, crowned with ivy, engirt with
a nebris, and expressing tender and dreamy emotions. Praxiteles
sculptured several figures of Eros, or the god of love, of which that at
Thespiae attracted visitors to the city in the time of Cicero. It was
subsequently carried to Rome, and perished by a conflagration in the
time of Titus. One of the most celebrated statues of this artist was an
Apollo, many copies of which still exist. His works were very numerous,
but chiefly from the circle of Dionysus, Aphrodite, and Eros, in which
adoration for corporeal attractions is the most marked peculiarity, and
for which the artist was fitted by his life with the hetaerae.

[Sidenote: Scopas.]

Scopas was his contemporary, and was the author of the celebrated group
of Niobe, which is one of the chief ornaments of the gallery of
sculpture at Florence. He flourished about three hundred and fifty years
before Christ, and wrought chiefly in marble. He was employed in
decorating the Mausoleum which Artemisia erected to her husband, one of
the wonders of the world. His masterpiece is said to have been a group
representing Achilles conducted to the island of Leuce by the divinities
of the sea, which ornamented the shrine of Domitius in the Flaminian
Circus. In this, tender grace, heroic grandeur, daring power, and
luxurious fullness of life were combined with wonderful harmony.
[Footnote: Muller, 125.] Like the other great artists of this school,
there was the grandeur and sublimity for which Phidias was celebrated,
but a greater refinement and luxury, and skill in the use of drapery.

[Sidenote: Lysippus.]

[Sidenote: The works of Lysippus.]

Sculpture in Greece culminated, as an art, in Lysippus, who worked
chiefly in bronze. He is said to have executed fifteen hundred statues,
and was much esteemed by Alexander the Great, by whom he was extensively
patronized. He represented men, not as they were, but as they appeared
to be; and, if he exaggerated, he displayed great energy of action. He
aimed to idealize merely human beauty, and his imitation of Nature was
carried out in the minutest details. None of his works are extant; but
as he alone was permitted to make the statue of Alexander, we infer that
he had no equals. The Emperor Tiberius transferred one of his statues,
that of an athlete, from the baths of Agrippa to his own chamber, which
so incensed the people that he was obliged to restore it. His favorite
subject was Hercules, and a colossal statue of this god was carried to
Rome by Fabius Maximus, when he took Tarentum, and afterwards was
transferred to Constantinople. The Farnese Hercules and the Belvidere
Torso are probably copies of this work. He left many eminent scholars,
among whom were Chares, who executed the famous Colossus of Rhodes,
Agesander, Polydorus, and Athenodorus, who sculptured the group of the
"Laocoon." The Rhodian School was the immediate offshoot from the school
of Lysippus at Sicyon, and from this small island of Rhodes the Romans,
when they conquered it, carried away three thousand statues. The
Colossus was one of the wonders of the world, seventy cubits in height,
and the Laocoon is a perfect miracle of art, in which group pathos is
exhibited in the highest degree ever attained in sculpture. It was
discovered in 1506 near the baths of Titus, and is one of the choicest
remains of ancient plastic art.

The great artists of antiquity did not confine themselves to the
representation of man; but they also carved animals with exceeding
accuracy and beauty. Nicias was famous for his dogs, Myron for his cows,
and Lysippus for his horses. Praxiteles composed his celebrated lion
after a living animal. "The horses of the frieze of the Elgin Marbles
appear to live and move; to roll their eyes, to gallop, prance, and
curvet; the veins of their faces and legs seem distended with
circulation. The beholder is charmed with the deer-like lightness and
elegance of their make; and although the relief is not above an inch
from the back-ground, and they are so much smaller than nature, we can
scarcely suffer reason to persuade us they are not alive." [Footnote:
Flaxman, _Lectures on Sculpture_.]

[Sidenote: Cameos and medals.]

The Greeks also carved gems, cameos, medals, and vases, with
unapproachable excellence. Very few specimens have come down to our
times, but those which we possess show great beauty both in design and
execution.

[Sidenote: Sack of the Grecian cities.]

Grecian statuary commenced with ideal representations of deities, and
was carried to the greatest perfection by Phidias in his statues of
Jupiter and Minerva. Then succeeded the school of Praxiteles, in which
the figures of gods and goddesses were still represented, but in mortal
forms. The school of Lysippus was famous for the statues of celebrated
men, especially in cities where Macedonian rulers resided. Artists were
expected henceforth to glorify kings and powerful nobles and rulers by
portrait statues. The plastic art then degenerated. Nor were works of
original genius produced, but rather copies or varieties from the three
great schools to which allusion has been made. Sculpture may have
multiplied, but not new creations; although some imitations of great
merit were produced, like the "Hermaphrodite," the "Torso," the Farnese
"Hercules," and the "Fighting Gladiator." When Corinth was sacked by
Mummius, some of the finest statues of Greece were carried to Rome, and
after the civil war between Caesar and Pompey the Greek artists emigrated
to Italy. The fall of Syracuse introduced many works of priceless value
into Rome; but it was from Athens, Delphi, Corinth, Elis, and other
great centres of art, that the richest treasures were brought. Greece
was despoiled to ornament Italy. The Romans did not create a school of
sculpture. They borrowed wholly from the Greeks, yet made, especially in
the time of Hadrian, many beautiful statues. They were fond of this art,
and all eminent men had statues erected to their memory. The busts of
emperors were found in every great city, and Rome was filled with
statues. The monuments of the Romans were even more numerous than those
of the Greeks, and among them some admirable portraits are found. These
sculptures did not express that consummation of beauty and grace, of
refinement and sentiment, which marked the Greeks; but the imitations
were good. Art had reached its perfection under Lysippus; there was
nothing more to learn. Genius in that department could soar no higher.
It will never rise to loftier heights.