Laocoon

“All the description of his future race from Ascanius, and the battles, in the order in which they should occur.” It would have been impossible for the poet, in the same short space of time occupied by Vulcan in his work, to mention by name the long line of descendants, and to tell of all their battles in the order of their occurrence. That seems to be the meaning of Servius’s somewhat obscure words: “Opportune ergo Virgilius, quia non videtur simul et narrationis celeritas potuisse connecti, et opus tam velociter expedire, ut ad verbum posset occurrere.” Since Virgil could bring forward but a small part of “the unnarratable text of the shield,” and not even that little while Vulcan was at work, he was obliged to reserve it till the whole was finished. For Virgil’s sake, I hope that this argument of Servius is baseless. My excuse is much more creditable to him. What need was there of putting the whole of Roman history on a shield? With few pictures Homer made his shield an epitome of all that was happening in the world. It would almost seem that Virgil, despairing of surpassing the Greek in the design and execution of his pictures, was determined to exceed him at least in their number, and that would have been the height of childishness.

Note 40, p. 118.

“Scuto ejus, in quo Amazonum prœlium cælavit intumescente ambitu parmæ; ejusdem concava parte deorum et gigantum, dimicationem.”

“Her shield, on the convex side of which he sculptured a battle of the Amazons, and on the concave side the contest of the gods and giants.” (Plinius, lib. xxxvi. sect. 4.)

Note 41, p. 122.

The first begins at line 483 and goes to line 489; the second extends from 490 to 509; the third, from 510 to 540; the fourth, from 541 to 549; the fifth, from 550 to 560; the sixth, from 561 to 572; the seventh, from 573 to 586; the eighth, from 587 to 589; the ninth, from 590 to 605; and the tenth, from 606 to 608. The third picture alone is not so introduced; but that it is one by itself is evident from the words introducing the second,—ἐν δὲ δύω ποίησε πόλεις,—as also from the nature of the subject.

Note 42, p. 123.

Iliad, vol. v. obs. p. 61. In this passage Pope makes an entirely false use of the expression “aerial perspective,” which, in fact, has nothing to do with the diminishing of the size according to the increased distance, but refers only to the change of color occasioned by the air or other medium through which the object is seen. A man capable of this blunder may justly be supposed ignorant of the whole subject.

Note 43, p. 128.

Constantinus Manasses Compend. Chron. p. 20 (edit. Venet). Madame Dacier was well pleased with this portrait of Manasses, except for its tautology. “De Helenæ pulchritudine omnium optime Constantinus Manasses; nisi in eo tautologiam reprehendas.” (Ad Dictyn Cretensem, lib. i. cap. 3, p. 5.) She also quotes, according to Mezeriac (Comment. sur les Epîtres d’Ovide, T. i. p. 361), the descriptions given by Dares Phrygius, and Cedrenus, of the beauty of Helen. In the first there is one trait which sounds rather strange. Dares says that Helen had a mole between her eyebrows: “notam inter duo supercilia habentem.” But that could not have been a beauty. I wish the Frenchwoman had given her opinion. I, for my part, regard the word “nota” as a corruption, and think that Dares meant to speak of what the Greeks called μεσόφρυον, and the Latins, “glabella.” He means to say that Helen’s eyebrows did not meet, but that there was a little space between them. The taste of the ancients was divided on this point. Some considered this space between the eyebrows beauty, others not. (Junius de Pictura Vet. lib. iii. cap. 9, p. 245.) Anacreon took a middle course. The eyebrows of his beloved maiden were neither perceptibly separated, nor were they fully grown together: they tapered off delicately at a certain point. He says to the artist who is to paint her (Od. 28):—

This is Pauer’s reading, but the meaning is the same in other versions, and has been rightly given by Henr. Stephano:—

But if my interpretation of Dares’ meaning be the true one, what should we read instead of “notam?” Perhaps “moram.” For certainly “mora” may mean not only the interval of time before something happens, but also the impediment, the space between one thing and another.

is the wish of the raving Hercules in Seneca, which Gronovius very well explains thus: “Optat se medium jacere inter duas Symplegades, illarum velut moram, impedimentum, obicem; qui eas moretur, vetet aut satis arcte conjungi, aut rursus distrahi.” The same poet uses “laceratorum moræ” in the sense of “juncturæ.” (Schrœderus ad. v. 762. Thyest.)

Note 44, p. 131.

Dialogo della Pittura, intitolata l’Aretino: Firenze 1735, p. 178. “Se vogliono i Pittori senza fatica trovare un perfetto esempio di bella Donna, legiano quelle Stanze dell’ Ariosto, nelle quali egli discrive mirabilmente le belezze della Fata Alcina; e vedranno parimente, quanto i buoni Poeti siano ancora essi Pittori.”

Ibid. “Ecco, che, quanto alla proporzione, l’ingeniosissimo Ariosto assegna la migliore, che sappiano formar le mani de’ più eccellenti Pittori, usando questa voce industri, per dinotar la diligenza, che conviene al buono artefice.”

Note 46, p. 132.

Ibid. “Qui l’Ariosto colorisce, e in questo suo colorire dimostra essere un Titiano.”

Note 47, p. 132.

Ibid. “Poteva l’Ariosto nella guisa, che ha detto chioma bionda, dir chioma d’oro: ma gli parve forse, che havrebbe havuto troppo del Poetico. Da che si può ritrar, che ’l Pittore dee imitar l’oro, e non metterlo (come fanno i Miniatori) nelle sue Pitture, in modo, che si possa dire, que’ capelli non sono d’oro, ma par che risplendano, come l’oro.” What Dolce goes on to quote from Athenæus is remarkable, but happens to be a misquotation. I shall speak of it in another place.

Note 48, p. 132.

Ibid. “Il naso, che discende giù, havendo peraventura la considerazione a quelle forme de’ nasi, che si veggono ne’ ritratti delle belle Romane antiche.”

Note 49, p. 143.

Pliny says of Apelles (lib. xxxv. sect. 36): “Fecit et Dianam sacrificantium Virginum choro mixtam; quibus vicisse Homeri versus videtur id ipsum describentis.” “He also made a Diana surrounded by a band of virgins performing a sacrifice; a work in which he would seem to have surpassed the verses of Homer describing the same thing.” This praise may be perfectly just; for beautiful nymphs surrounding a beautiful goddess, who towers above them by the whole height of her majestic brow, form a theme more fitting the painter than the poet. But I am somewhat suspicious of the word “sacrificantium.” What have the nymphs of Diana to do with offering sacrifices? Is that the occupation assigned them by Homer? By no means. They roam with the goddess over hills and through forest; they hunt, play, dance. (Odyss. vi. 102–106).

Pliny, therefore, can hardly have written “sacrificantium,” rather “venantium” (hunting), or something like it; perhaps “sylvis vagantium” (roaming the woods), which corresponds more nearly in number of letters to the altered word. “Saltantium” (bounding), approaches most nearly to the παίζουσι of Homer. Virgil, also, in his imitation of this passage, represents the nymphs as dancing. (Æneid, i. 497, 498.)

Spence gives a remarkable criticism on this passage. (Polymetis, dial. viii.) “This Diana,” he says, “both in the picture and in the descriptions, was the Diana Venatrix, though she was not represented, either by Virgil or Apelles or Homer, as hunting with her nymphs; but as employed with them in that sort of dances which of old were regarded as very solemn acts of devotion.” In a note he adds, “The expression of παίζειν, used by Homer on this occasion, is scarce proper for hunting; as that of “choros exercere,” in Virgil, should be understood of the religious dances of old, because dancing, in the old Roman idea of it, was indecent, even for men, in public, unless it were the sort of dances used in honor of Mars or Bacchus or some other of their gods.” Spence supposes that those solemn dances are here referred to, which, among the ancients, were counted among the acts of religion. “It is in consequence of this,” he says, “that Pliny, in speaking of Diana’s nymphs on this very occasion, uses the word “sacrificare” of them, which quite determines these dances of theirs to have been of the religious kind.” He forgets that, in Virgil, Diana joins in the dance, “exercet Diana choros.” If this were a religious dance, in whose honor did Diana dance it? in her own, or in honor of some other deity? Both suppositions are absurd. If the old Romans did hold dancing in general to be unbecoming in a grave person, was that a reason why their poets should transfer the national gravity to the manners of the gods, which were very differently represented by the old Greek poets? When Horace says of Venus (Od. iv. lib. i.),—

“Now Cytherean Venus leads the bands, under the shining moon, and the fair graces, joined with the nymphs, beat the ground with alternate feet,”—were these, likewise, sacred, religious dances? But it is wasting words to argue against such a conceit.

Note 50, p. 145.

Plinius, lib. xxxiv. sect. 19. “Ipse tamen corporum tenus curiosus, animi sensus non expressisse videtur, capillum quoque et pubem non emendatius fecisse, quam rudis antiquitas instituisset.

“Hic primus nervos et venas expressit, capillumque diligentius.”

Note 51, p. 162.

The Connoisseur, vol. i. no. 21. The beauty of Knonmquaiha is thus described. “He was struck with the glossy hue of her complexion, which shone like the jetty down on the black hogs of Hessaqua; he was ravished with the prest gristle of her nose; and his eyes dwelt with admiration on the flaccid beauties of her breasts, which descended to her navel.” And how were these charms set off by art? “She made a varnish of the fat of goats mixed with soot, with which she anointed her whole body as she stood beneath the rays of the sun; her locks were clotted with melted grease, and powdered with the yellow dust of Buchu; her face, which shone like the polished ebony, was beautifully varied with spots of red earth, and appeared like the sable curtain of the night bespangled with stars; she sprinkled her limbs with wood-ashes, and perfumed them with the dung of Stinkbingsem. Her arms and legs were entwined with the shining entrails of an heifer; from her neck there hung a pouch composed of the stomach of a kid; the wings of an ostrich overshadowed the fleshy promontories behind; and before she wore an apron formed of the shaggy ears of a lion.”

Here is further the marriage ceremony of the loving pair. “The Surri, or Chief Priest, approached them, and, in a deep voice, chanted the nuptial rites to the melodious grumbling of the Gom-Gom; and, at the same time (according to the manner of Caffraria), bedewed them plentifully with the urinary benediction. The bride and bridegroom rubbed in the precious stream with ecstasy, while the briny drops trickled from their bodies, like the oozy surge from the rocks of Chirigriqua.”

Note 52, p. 166.

The Sea-Voyage, act iii. scene 1. A French pirate ship is thrown upon a desert island. Avarice and envy cause quarrels among the men, and a couple of wretches, who had long suffered extreme want on the island, seize a favorable opportunity to put to sea in the ship. Robbed thus of their whole stock of provisions, the miserable men see death, in its worst forms, staring them in the face, and express to each other their hunger and despair as follows:—

But this is nothing, compared with the next scene, when the ship’s surgeon enters.

Note 53, p. 177.

Æneid, lib. ii. 7, and especially lib. xi. 183. We might safely, therefore, add such a work to the list of lost writings by this author.

Note 54, p. 179.

Consult the list of inscriptions on ancient works of art in Mar. Gudius. (ad Phædri fab. v. lib. i.), and, in connection with that, the correction made by Gronovius. (Præf. ad Tom. ix. Thesauri Antiq. Græc.)

Note 55, p. 182.

He at least expressly promises to do so: “quæ suis locis reddam” (which I shall speak of in their proper place). But if this was not wholly forgotten, it was at least done very cursorily, and not at all in the way this promise had led us to expect. When he writes (lib. xxxv. sect. 39), “Lysippus quoque Æginæ picturæ suæ inscripsit, ἐνέκαυσεν; quod profecto non fecisset, nisi encaustica inventa,” he evidently uses ἐνέκαυσεν to prove something quite different. If he meant, as Hardouin supposes, to indicate in this passage one of the works whose inscription was written in definite past time, it would have been worth his while to put in a word to that effect. Hardouin finds reference to the other two works in the following passage: “Idem (Divus Augustus) in Curia quoque, quam in Comitio consecrabat, duas tabulas impressit parieti: Nemeam sedentem supra leonem, palmigeram ipsam, adstante cum baculo sene, cujus supra caput tabula bigæ dependet. Nicias scripsit se inussisse; tali enim usus est verbo. Alterius tabulæ admiratio est, puberem filium seni patri similem esse, salva ætatis differentia, supervolante aquila draconem complexa. Philochares hoc suum opus esse testatus est.” (Lib. xxxv. sect. 10.) Two different pictures are here described which Augustus had set up in the newly built senate-house. The second was by Philochares, the first by Nicias. All that is said of the picture by Philochares is plain and clear, but there are certain difficulties in regard to the other. It represented Nemea seated on a lion, a palm-branch in her hand, and near her an old man with a staff: “cujus supra caput tabula bigæ dependet.” What is the meaning of that? “over his head hung a tablet on which was painted a two-horse chariot.” That is the only meaning the words will bear. Was there, then, a smaller picture hung over the large one? and were both by Nicias? Hardouin must so have understood it, else where were the two pictures by Nicias, since the other is expressly ascribed to Philochares? “Inscripsit Nicias igitur geminæ huic tabulæ suum nomen in hunc modum: Ὁ ΝΙΚΙΑΣ ΕΝΕΚΑΥΣΕΝ: atque adeo e tribus operibus, quæ absolute fuisse inscripta, ILLE FECIT, indicavit Præfatio ad Titum, duo hæc sunt Niciae.” I should like to ask Hardouin one question. If Nicias had really used the indefinite, and not the definite past tense, and Pliny had merely wished to say that the master, instead of γράφειν, had used ἐγκαίειν, would he not still have been obliged to say in Latin, “Nicias scripsit se inussisse?” But I will not insist upon this point. Pliny may really have meant to indicate here one of the three works before referred to. But who will be induced to believe that there were two pictures, placed one above the other? Not I for one. The words “cujus supra caput tabula bigæ dependet” must be a corruption. “Tabula bigæ,” a picture of a two-horse chariot, does not sound much like Pliny, although Pliny does elsewhere use “biga” in the singular. What sort of a two-horse chariot? Such as were used in the races at the Nemæan games, so that this little picture should, from its subject, be related to the chief one? That cannot be; for not two but four horse chariots were usual in the Nemæan games. (Schmidius in Prol. ad Nemeonicas, p. 2.) At one time, I thought that Pliny might, instead of “bigæ,” have written a Greek word, πτυχίον, which the copyists did not understand. For we know, from a passage in Antigonus Carystius, quoted by Zenobius (conf. Gronovius, T. ix. Antiquit. Græc. Præf. p. 7), that the old artists did not always put their name on the work itself, but sometimes on a separate tablet, attached to the picture or statue, and this tablet was called πτυχίον. The word “tabula, tabella,” might have been written in the margin in explanation of the Greek word, and at last have crept into the text. πτυχίον was turned into “bigæ,” and so we get “tabula bigæ.” This πτυχίον agrees perfectly with what follows; for the next sentence contains what was written on it. The whole passage would then read thus: “cujus supra caput πτυχίον dependet, quo Nicias scripsit se inussisse.” My correction is rather a bold one, I acknowledge. Need a critic feel obliged to suggest the proper reading for every passage that he can prove to be corrupted? I will rest content with having done the latter, and leave the former to some more skilful hand. But to return to the subject under discussion. If Pliny be here speaking of but a single picture by Nicias, on which he had inscribed his name in definite past time, and if the second picture thus inscribed be the above-mentioned one of Lysippus, where is the third? That I cannot tell. If I might look for it elsewhere among the old writers, the question were easily answered. But it ought to be found in Pliny; and there, I repeat, I am entirely unable to discover it.

Thus Statius says “obnixa pectora” (Thebaid. lib. vi. v. 863):

which the old commentator of Barths explains by “summa vi contra nitentia.” Thus Ovid says (Halievt. v. ii.), “obnixa fronte,” when describing the “scarus” trying to force its way through the fish-trap, not with his head, but with his tail.

Note 57, p. 192.

Geschichte der Kunst, part ii. p. 328. “He produced the Antigone, his first tragedy, in the third year of the seventy-seventh Olympiad.” The time is tolerably exact, but it is quite a mistake to suppose that this first tragedy was the Antigone. Neither is it so called by Samuel Petit, whom Winkelmann quotes in a note. He expressly puts the Antigone in the third year of the eighty-fourth Olympiad. The following year, Sophocles went with Pericles to Samos, and the year of this expedition can be determined with exactness. In my life of Sophocles, I show, from a comparison with a passage of the elder Pliny, that the first tragedy of this author was probably Triptolemus. (Lib. xviii. sect. 12.) Pliny is speaking of the various excellence of the fruits of different countries, and concludes thus: “Hæ fuere sententiæ, Alexandro magno regnante, cum clarissima fuit Græcia, atque in toto terrarum orbe potentissima; ita tamen ut ante mortem ejus annis fere CXLV. Sophocles poeta in fabula Triptolemo frumentum Italicum ante cuncta laudaverit, ad verbum translata sententia:

He is here not necessarily speaking of the first tragedy of Sophocles, to be sure. But the date of that, fixed by Plutarch, the scholiast, and the Arundelian marbles, as the seventy-seventh Olympiad, corresponds so exactly with the date assigned by Pliny to the Triptolemus, that we can hardly help regarding that as the first of Sophocles’ tragedies. The calculation is easily made. Alexander died in the hundred and fourteenth Olympiad. One hundred and forty-five years cover thirty-six Olympiads and one year, which subtracted from the total, gives seventy-seven. The Triptolemus of Sophocles appeared in the seventy-seventh Olympiad; the last year of this same Olympiad is the date of his first tragedy: we may naturally conclude, therefore, that these tragedies are one. I show at the same time that Petit might have spared himself the writing of the whole half of the chapter in his “Miscellanea” which Winkelmann quotes (xviii. lib. iii.). In the passage of Pliny, which he thinks to amend, it is quite unnecessary to change the name of the Archon Aphepsion into Demotion, or ἀνεψιός. He need only have looked from the third to the fourth year of the seventy-seventh Olympiad to find that the Archon of that year was called Aphepsion by the ancient authors quite as often as Phædon, if not oftener. He is called Phædon by Diodorus Siculus, Dionysius Halicarnassus, and the anonymous author of the table of the Olympiads; while the Arundelian marbles, Apollodorus, and, quoting him, Diogenes Laertius, call him Aphepsion. Plutarch calls him by both names; Phædon in the life of Theseus and Aphepsion in the life of Cimon. It is therefore probable, as Palmerius supposes, “Aphepsionem et Phædonem Archontas fuisse eponymos; scilicet, uno in magistratu mortuo, suffectus fuit alter.” (Exercit. p. 452.) This reminds me that Winkelmann, in his first work on the imitation of Greek art, allowed an error to creep in with regard to Sophocles. “The most beautiful of the youths danced naked in the theatre, and Sophocles, the great Sophocles, was in his youth the first to show himself thus to his fellow-citizens.” Sophocles never danced naked on the stage. He danced around the trophies after the victory of Salamis, according to some authorities naked, but according to others clothed. (Athen. lib. i. p. m. 20.) Sophocles was one of the boys who was brought for safety to Salamis, and on this island it pleased the tragic muse to assemble her three favorites in a gradation typical of their future career. The bold Æschylus helped gain the victory; the blooming Sophocles danced around the trophies; and on the same happy island, on the very day of the victory, Euripides was born.