Chap. 5.] WIIEX MARBLE WAS FIRST USED IX BUILDINGS. 323 



Some minute works in marble have also gained reputation for 

 their artists : by Myrmecides, 80 there was a four-horse chariot, 

 so small that it could be covered, driver and all, by the wings 

 of a fly ; and by Calibrates, 31 some ants, in marble, the feet 

 and other limbs of which were so line as to escape the sight. 



CHAP. 5. (G.) AT WHAT IEUIOI) MAIIBLE WAS FIliST USED IN 



BUILDINGS. 



This must suffice for the sculptors in marble, and the works 

 that have gained the highest repute; with reference to which 

 subject it occurs to me to remark, that spotted marbles were not 

 then in fashion. In making their statues, these artists used the 

 marble of Thasos also, 3 - one of the Cyclades, and of Lesbos, this 

 last being rather more livid than the other. The poet Menander, 

 in Tact, who was a very careful enquirer into all matters of 

 luxury, is the first who has spoken, and that but rarely, of va- 

 riegated marbles, and, indeed, of the employment of marble in 

 general. Columns of this material were at first employed in 

 temples, not on grounds of superior elegance, (for that was not 

 thought of, as yet), but because no material could be found of 

 a more substantial nature. It was under these circumstances, 

 that the Temple 33 of the Olympian Jupiter was commenced at 

 Athens, the columns of which were brought by Sylla to Home, 

 for the buildings in the Capitol. 



Still, however, there had been a distinction drawn between 

 ordinary stone and marble, iu the days of Homer even. The 

 poet speaks in one passage of a person 31 being struck down 

 with a huge mass of marble; but that is all; and when he 

 describes the abodes of royalty adorned with every elegance, 

 besides brass, gold, elect rum,* 4 and silver, he only mentions 

 ivory. Variegated marbles, in my opinion, were first dis- 

 covered in the quarries of Chios, when the inhabitants were 

 building the Avails of their city ; a circumstance which gave 

 rise to a facetious repartee on the part of M. Cicero. It being 

 the practice witli them to show these walls to everybody, as 



i0 A sculptor of Miletus. See 15. vii. c. 21. 



31 A Loefd&monian artist. Sec 13. vii. c. 21. 



*- As well as that of 1'aros. 



33 Only computed in the time of the Emperor Adrian. 



31 Cthrioiies, the charioteer of Hector. See 11. B. xvi. 1. 735. 



25 See 15. x^xiii. c. 23. 



