224 Notices respecting New Books* 



pictures of sava^^e nations. The designers (or drawers) were 

 therefore not painters, properly so called ; they were indifferent 

 copyists: and the paintings on the Greek vases are not originals^ 

 but copies of pictures, bas-reliefs, or statues, which had acquired 

 celebrity. 



How could these designers make a collection of studies of these 

 fine works ? What substances did they employ in lieu of our dif- 

 ferent kinds of pencils, of our transparent paper ? &c. It is pro- 

 bable that our mode of tracing was unknown to them, by which 

 the most moderate artists trace faithful copies ; what process did 

 tliey use in its place ? Perhaps they made sketches of the pic- 

 tures which they intended to imitate, or of those which they 

 had seen on their travels. Hence it comes that, in the paintings 

 on vases, the principal parts are well executed, and the extre- 

 mities are very incorrect. Having trusted the latter merely to 

 their memory, they were incapable of drawing them faithfully. 

 M. de Rossi illustrates this idea by a striking example. The 

 potters of Urbino, the native town of Raphael, adorned their 

 ware with subjects designed by that great master and his pupils; 

 we recognise them by the nobleness of the style, by the spirit of 

 the design ; but how far is the execution from equalling the sub- 

 ject ! 



Notwithstanding the imperfections of the paintings on the 

 Greek vases, the study of them must be very useful to our artists; 

 they will find means to form their taste in the nobleness, the sim- 

 plicity of the compositions, in the grace, the energy, the just ex- 

 pression of the attitudes. It is there we find true models of the 

 folds of draperies, not only in figures at rest, such as statues, but 

 also in figures that are in motion. 



The name of Sicilian vases is improperly given to those in 

 which the figures are distinguished from the ground by their black 

 or dark colour, (whereas in the others, the figures are yellow on a 

 dark ground,) and which are found in other places besides Sicily. 

 This mode recalls to mind the invention of painting, the imita- 

 tion of the shadow on a wall : the style of design is barbarous and 

 incorrect; hence many antiquaries have assigned them the highest 

 antiquity. They would have been in the right, if they had said 

 that this style, appearing to be appropriated to masquerades, ca- 

 ricatures, and the like,was probably imitated at all times in sub- 

 jects of this kind. What evidently proves it is, that in the ma- 

 imfacture of these vases, the elegance of their forms is the same 

 as in the vases of the finest style, the vases of Nola : the same 

 must be said of the ornaments which accompany the figures, 

 flowers, festoons, &c., which are the same, and equally elegant. 

 However, what we most frequently see on the vases called Sici- 

 lian, are Bacchanalia, that is to say, nia;iquerades, orgies, cari- 

 catures, 



