Page:A History of Art in Chaldæa & Assyria Vol 2.djvu/125

Themes of Ciiald/EoAssyrian Sculpture. 107 to represent processions. Sometimes these consist of the king's servants carrying the ensign of royalty behind him (Vol. I. Figs. 22, 23, and 24) ; sometimes of priests carrying the images of the gods (Vol. I. Figs. 13 and 14); but more often of war chariots, cavalry, and infantry (Fig. 15), or bands of prisoners conducted by foot soldiers (Fig. 48). To groups and single individuals progressing in long succession the sculptor gave a certain rhythm that is not without its dignity, but yet his treatment of such themes is deficient in variety. The same fault occurs in Egyptian dealings with similar subjects ; the figures seem all to reproduce a single type, as if they had been stencilled. The designer ,.'uti£- & I Tvff# Jiv;k^ '.•<:)'■) - ^^Sg&i ;a^^kàsâÉ£i^ëg&S*Js£ WW. Fig. 48. — Procession of captives ; from Layard. has made no real effort to avoid monotony ; he has no suspicion of those skilful combinations by which, the Greek sculptor would succeed in reconciling the unity of the whole with variety of detail ; he makes no attempt to make those slight changes between one group and another that please and amuse the eye without hurting the general symmetry, or breaking those great leading lines by which the general character and movement of the com- position is determined. 1 1 This impression is still more strongly felt on glancing through the plates in which Sir H. Layard has reproduced in their entirety the series of sculptures which we can only show in fragmentary fashion. Compare, for example, the Panathenaic