SOME PRESENT PROBLEMS IN THE HISTORY OF GREEK 



SCULPTURE 



BY FRANK BIGELOW TARBELL 



[Frank Bigelow Tarbell, Professor of Classical Archaeology, University of Chicago, 

 Chicago, Illinois, b. 1853, Groton, Massachusetts. A.B". Yale, 1873; Ph.D. ibid. 

 1879; Douglas Fellow, Tutor in Greek, Yale College, 1876-82; Assistant Pro- 

 fessor of Greek and Instructor in Logic, Yale College, 1882-87; Annual Director 

 of the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Greece, 1888-89; In- 

 structor in Greek, Harvard University, 1889-92. Member of the American Philo- 

 logical Association, Archaeological Institute of America, Society for the Promo- 

 tion of Hellenic Studies. Author of The Philippics of Demosthenes; A History 

 of Greek Art.] 



BY the term " classical art/' as used in the language of this Congress, 

 I understand Greek art and what is commonly called Roman art, 

 which is mainly late Greek art on Roman soil. The history of each 

 great branch of this art architecture, painting, and sculpture - 

 presents problems which might profitably be here discussed. Thus in 

 the field of architecture we might take up the origins of the Doric and 

 Ionic orders, or the question as to how much of what we are accus- 

 tomed to think of as characteristic of Roman architecture its use 

 of arches, vaults, and domes, its combination of the arch with the 

 decorative column and entablature, its treatment of architectural 

 details and ornaments was borrowed from Greek architecture as it 

 existed in Alexandria, in Antioch, and in other flourishing centres of 

 late Greek civilization. In the field of painting an attempt might 

 be made to explain on what evidence and by what methods may 

 be conjured up some shadowy semblance of the works of the great 

 painters of the fifth and fourth centuries B. c. ; or, under the stimu- 

 lus of a recent essay, 1 to consider the extent of the originality in 

 design and in technique displayed by the extant frescoes of the 

 Roman imperial period. 



Clearly, however, it would be unwise, within the limits of a single 

 address, to include matters so various, and I have therefore chosen 

 to confine myself to a single branch of Greek art, namely, sculpture. 



What would an ideal history of Greek sculpture be? Suppose that 

 a man equipped with the highest native capacity for the task and 

 with the best training attainable at the present day had sources of 

 knowledge as complete for the Greek period as for the nineteenth 

 century of our era. what manner of history would he produce? What- 

 ever else his work might contain, and that might be much. it 

 would set forth clearly and unquestionably the general qualities 

 characteristic of Greek sculpture in each successive phase of its 

 development, the distinctive features of each great local school, and 

 1 Wickhoff, Roman Art (translated by Mrs. S. Arthur Strong). 



