between the older and the newer is furnished by the well-known statue of the calf-bearer, an Athenian preparing to sacrifice a calf to the deities, which is made of marble of Hymettus, and in robust clumsiness of forms is not far removed from the limestone pediments. The sacrificer has been commonly spoken of as Hermes or Theseus, but he seems rather to be an ordinary human votary.
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| Fig. 22.—Figure by Antenor, restored. |
In the time of Peisistratus or his sons a peristyle of columns was added to the old temple of Athena; and this necessitated the preparation of fresh pediments. These were of marble. In one of them was represented the battle between gods and giants; in the midst Athena herself striking at a prostrate foe (fig. 21). In these figures no eye can fail to trace remarkable progress. On about the same level of art are the charming statues dedicated to Athena, which were set up in the latter half of the 6th century in the Acropolis, whose graceful though conventional forms and delicate colouring make them one of the great attractions of the Acropolis Museum. We show a figure (fig. 22) which, if it be rightly connected with the basis on which it stands, is the work of the sculptor Antenor, who was also author of a celebrated group representing the tyrant-slayers, Harmodius and Aristogiton. To the same age belong many other votive reliefs of the Acropolis, representing horsemen, scribes and other votaries of Athena.
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| Fig. 23.—Bust from Crete. |
From Athens we pass to the seats of Dorian art. And in doing so we find a complete change of character. In place of Dorian draped goddesses and female figures, we find nude male forms. In place of Ionian softness and elegance, we find hard, rigid outlines, strong muscular development, Dorian sculpture. a greater love of and faithfulness to the actual human form—the influence of the palaestra rather than of the harem. To the known series of archaic male figures, recent years have added many examples. We may especially mention a series of figures from the temple of Apollo Ptoos in Boeotia, probably representing the god himself. Still more noteworthy are two colossal nude figures of Apollo, remarkable both for force and for rudeness, found at Delphi, the inscriptions of which prove them to be the work of an Argive sculptor. (Plate V. fig. 76.) From Crete we have acquired the upper part of a draped figure (fig. 23), whether male or female is not certain, which should be an example of the early Daedalid school, whence the art of Peloponnesus was derived; but we can scarcely venture to treat it as a characteristic product of that school; rather the likeness to the dedication of Nicandra is striking.
Another remarkable piece of Athenian sculpture, of the time of the Persian Wars, is the group of the tyrannicides Harmodius and Aristogiton, set up by the people of Athens, and made by the sculptors Critius and Nesiotes. These figures were hard and rigid in outline, but showing some progress in the treatment of the nude. Copies are preserved in the museum of Naples (Plate I. fig. 50). It should be observed that one of the heads does not belong.
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| Fig. 24.—Head of Hera: Olympia. | Fig. 25.—Spartan Tombstone: Berlin. |
Next in importance to Athens, as a find-spot for works of early Greek art, ranks Olympia. Olympia, however, did not suffer like Athens from sudden violence, and the explorations there have brought to light a continuous series of remains, beginning with the bronze tripods Olympia, Sparta, Selinus. of the geometric age already mentioned and ending at the barbarian invasions of the 4th century A.D. Notable among the 6th-century stone-sculpture of Olympia are the pediment of the treasury of the people of Megara, in which is represented a battle of gods and giants, and a huge rude head of Hera (fig. 24), which seems to be part of the image worshipped in the Heraeum. Its flatness and want of style are noteworthy. Among the temples of Greece proper the Heraeum of Olympia stands almost alone for antiquity and interest, its chief rival, besides the temples of Athens, being the other temple of Hera at Argos. It appears to have been originally constructed of wood, for which stone was by slow degrees, part by part, substituted. In the time of Pausanias one of the pillars was still of oak, and at the present day the varying diameter of the columns and other structural irregularities bear witness to the process of constant renewal which must have taken place. The early small bronzes of Olympia form an important series, figures of deities standing or striding, warriors in their armour, athletes with exaggerated muscles, and women draped in the Ionian fashion, which did not become unpopular in Greece until after the Persian Wars. Excavations at Sparta have revealed interesting monuments belonging to the worship of ancestors, which seems in the conservative Dorian states of Greece to have been more strongly developed than elsewhere. On some of these stones, which doubtless belonged to the family cults of Sparta, we see the ancestor seated holding a wine-cup, accompanied by his faithful horse or dog; on some we see the ancestor and ancestress seated side by side (fig. 25), ready to receive the gifts of their descendants, who appear in the corner of the relief on a much smaller scale. The male figure holds a wine-cup, in allusion to the libations of wine made at the tomb. The female figure holds her veil and the pomegranate, the recognized food of the dead. A huge serpent stands erect behind the pair. The style of these sculptures is as striking as the subjects; we see lean, rigid
