33S 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[October, 



furmeii, destitute oT ;iU knowledge of expression iniii grace, and the 

 fascinations of varying liglits and sliadows. 



If then tlie (ireeks did not owe the superiority of their attainments 

 in ait, to the extrinsic aid of foreign states, if tln'ough tlie entire range 

 of Egyptian and Asiatic prochictions, we see, speaking comparatively, 

 absolutely nothing of that iniiigled grandeur, grace and beauty, which 

 is stamped in almost every creation of the pure Greek mind : we are 

 driven to the conclusion that they derived their excellence from tlieir 

 own direct and inherent genius ; that they had, what no other nation 

 possessed before, the elements of \mre and exalted art, within the 

 precincts of their own national mind: and were able, moreover, to re- 

 tine and purify all that they saw around them ; bringing about, in short, 

 an entirely new epoch in the history of art. It was tlieir leading aim, 

 and they accomplished it, to raise architecture from the unmeaning 

 and the colossal, into the simple, tlie grand, and the graceful; to trans- 

 form the emblematic ugliness which pervaded all the efforts of the 

 earlier sculptors, into the beauty and majesty of the perfect ideal ; 

 and to transform into the formerly cold and lifeless ])roductious of the 

 Eg\ ptian painters that -perfection of form, outline, and expression, 

 which shines forth for instance in the Venus Anidyomene. 



Now who does not perceive at once, from this brief detail, that the 

 rise of the arts in Rome, stands remarkably contrasted with that in the 

 country we have been reviewing. Greece, we have seen, was pre- 

 ceded by no people who had any clear or definite conception of what 

 was really and expressively beautiful, and evolved all that we most 

 admire and venerate from the recesses of her own national intellect : 

 Rome, on the contrary, was in the infancy of her existence, while 

 Greece was perfect and efflorescent, and had, in living in the midst of 

 such mental greatness, just that advantage which a gifted individual 

 has, on being born in an age of intellectual eminence. 



In the rise of art in Greece, and in the correspondent rise of art in 

 Rome, there is just this difference, that while with the former nation 

 it was uriginal, with the latter it was dtriralire; it is beyond cavil 

 that till the treasures of Greece were disclosed by conquest to the 

 eyes of the ambitious and aspiring Romans, there were no advances 

 made in art among them, worthy distinctive mention — nothing which 

 at all equalled, or can he regarded even as a forerunner to the eminence 

 they subsequently attained. 



The Romans in the first ages of their power, under the dominion of 

 the kings, and in the earlier periods of the republic, were practically 

 speaking, unacquainted witli the liberal arts. Simple, frugal, and hardy, 

 renowned for wisdom in the senate, and valour in the field, their minds 

 were more engrossed with constant endeavours to preserve unimpaired 

 the political institutions of their country, than to produce ought great 

 or noble in architecture, sculpture, and painting. The severity of their 

 manners forbade all unnecessary display, — they seemed entirely desti- 

 tute of all love for the beautiful, and all taste to appreciate it : the 

 great men of the time were neglectful of their city, and careless to 

 adorn it. They passed the principal part of their time, says Sallust, 

 in the retirement of the country, practising the frugality which pre- 

 vailed in the age, attending to the cultivation of their farms, taking 

 no pride in the outward decoration of their capital, and only visiting 

 it upon occasions of religious and judicial solemnity. Everything in 

 short, combines to prove that, unlike their celebrated predecessors, 

 they achieved nothing — unaided and alone, in exalted art. The 

 commencement of their artistic excellence, must be dated from the 

 period when the conquering legions of Scylla, laid siege to the elegant 

 and luxurious Athens ; and as tlie very extreme of refinement to which 

 she had arrived, proved a self-destroying ))o\ver in her constitution, 

 and, co-operating with other causes, sapped the vitals of her strength, 

 she fell an easy prey to the fury of the relentless dictator; under his 

 revolutionary violence the city of Athens was sacked, pilaged, and 

 destroyed : her matchless monuments of art were rudely transferred 

 from their legitimate resting places — were seized as trophies of Roman 

 valour, and sent to the cajntal to grace a Roman triumph. Unspairiiig 

 indeed and merciless was the hand of the conqueror upon the once 

 glorious and sacred city ; every thing of value was removed, even to 

 the ornaments which decorated the friezes of the temples, ami the 

 basso relievos on the walls. Syracuse, Carthage, and Corinth shared 

 a similar fate; spoliation and (lillage marked universally the progress 

 ol the Roman arms ; and the once proud states of Greece were, one 

 and all, compelled to own the superiority and bow to the power of the 

 foe. 



Thenceforward, Rome presented a different asjiect from what she 

 had done formerly; no longer severely great, and nationally simple, 

 she had laid aside the just, and equitable spirit of lier ancestors, and 

 by embarking in an unprincipled war, became, by her conquest of 

 Greece, possessed of some of the proudest memorials of human genius. 

 Italy was at once inundated with the productions of Greek talent; 

 men stood astonished at the perfection of works— the similitudes to 



which thev had never before witnessed, (ireciau artists were every- 

 where caressed and sought alter, and although this, in some respects was 

 desirable, yet, at the same time, it had the effect of putting a complete 

 extinguisher upon whatever risii'g t.ilent the Rora.in artists might have 

 possessed. When tlie grand, the majestic, and the beautiful from 

 Attica was exposed to the eyes of the proud citizens of the imperial 

 citv, they were charmed, fascinated, ami spell bound; they regarded 

 what they saw, as evidencing consummate excellence, ;uid despairing 

 of equalling that which they deemed unapproachable; the spirit of 

 emulation died within them.* 



The influx of foreign productions entirely suffocated native Italian 

 genius, Greek productions became matters of jMoperty, and dealers 

 sprung up who manufactured originals to supply the market of the 

 rich collector; galleries were formed to produce genius, wdiich had 

 sprung up, from national demand, without a single gallery, or a single 

 collection of any works, except the produclions of their native soil. 

 The most celebrated works were copied and re-cojiied by the Greeks 

 in all parts of the Mediterranean. Horace alludes to this, and there 

 can be no doubt whatever that the effect was to render all native at- 

 tempts of the Romans and Etruscans no longer available. For not one 

 great artist is named during the whole period of progressive decay, 

 from the Caesars to Constantine; and the Romans or Latins never pro- 

 duced any talent worth consideration, till the revival of art in Italy, 

 after so many ages, in the 1.5th century.'!' 



It is, therefore, abundantly clear from this comparison, that great 

 abatement on the score of originality must be made when reflecting on 

 the peculiar causes, which contributed to the full development of art 

 in ancient Rome. While among the gifted inhabitants of Greece, its 

 principles and its practice seem thoroughly indigenous; while we 

 search in vain, the arts of preceding and contemporaneous nations for 

 any traces of these manifold excellences which distinguish their im- 

 mortal productions ; while, in short, the eminence they attained, mainly 

 resulted from a creative, an ever active self energising influence pos- 

 sessed by the national intellect; with the people of Rome it was as 

 we have seen, entirely and emphatically otherwise. They of them- 

 selves evolved, not the material elements of the expressive and the 

 beautiful ; they derived all their notions of them from their prostrate 

 rivals, the Greeks. Their architecture, their sculpture, and their 

 painting, all breathes of Attica. It was constantly the aim of the 

 Italian artists to cultivate the Attic taste, they laboured not to produce 

 a distinctive style of art, but endeavoured simply to travel in the patli, 

 previously followed by the people of Greece. 



To do them, however, justice, it should be remarked that they ap- 

 pear less fettered in their architectural productions. In this branch 

 of art, we discern characteristics more strictlv national, and less slavishly 

 imitative than these which distinguish their sculpture or their paint- 

 ing. For although we are aware that before the conquest of Greece, 

 the structures of Rome were both rude and inelegant, and that to the 

 (ireeks, the Romans were especially indebted for the more polished 

 forms of cohimnar architecture, yet as it has been judiciously observed 

 by Mr. Hosking, " the difference between the Greek and Roman styles 

 of architecture is not merely in the preference given to one, over 

 another peculiar mode of columnar arrangement and com])osition, but 

 a different taste pervades even the details;" and a wide dep-arture is 

 frequently to be traced from the primitive forms of the ancient models. 

 By their discovery of the arch, which undoubtedly was imknown to 

 the Greeks, the principles of their architecture became more flexible 

 and less unbending; and they were enabled thereby, we do not say to 

 render their productions more strictly beautiful, but more decorative 

 and profusely ornate. The simplicity of the Ctreek forms could not 

 be excelled by any additional decorative embellishment, the outline of 

 their purest ediflces was in perfect harmony with all the acknowledged 

 principles of exalted art. But still, the Romans, whom unbounded 

 military success had swe'.led with the workings of the most ambitious 

 pride, anxious to erect edifices of corresjionding majesty with their 

 achievements in the field, which should be lit memorials of the vic- 

 tories they had won, and appropriate receptacles of the trophies they 

 had captured, threw around the architecture of their city all the fasci- 

 nations of gorgeous and elaborate decoration, and that violation of the 

 principhsof pure taste observable in their works, which if extended 

 to painting and sculpture, would have appeared ridiculous — was in 

 architecture redeemed, bv the vastuess of the objects to which it was 

 a|)plied, and the nature of the ends it was intended to serve. In all 

 their buildings they certainly show a less refined taste than the people 

 of Greece : it will be seen that they relied for effect less on the sim- 



' We intend Ihese remarks to apply chiefly toscili'ture and p:.in'.ing, they 

 cannot be extended to architeclure, as we shall here illor iec, without con- 

 siderable nio(li(ic;ilion. 



t See Art, Paintiu';. Encv- Britannia. 



