161,52. COLOURING OF STATUES. 277 



deesse videretur, tantumque earn partem e facie ostendit, 

 quam totam poterat ostendere." Qiiintilian (ii. 14) mentions 

 the same reason for his deviating from the custom of repre- 

 senting " the full face, which is the most beautiful in a 

 picture," and says " imaginem Antigoni latere tantum altero 

 ostendit;" and this being considered a deficient mode of 

 representation shows the low estimation in which they held 

 a mere profile. It appears that Pliny, in speaking of Cimon 

 being the inventor of " catagrajpha, hoc est obliquas ima- 

 gines" (xxxv. 8), also applies this term to faces in perspective, 

 or foreshortened, as he mentions them looking back, and in 

 various positions; and this treatment of the human head was 

 considered, with good reason, to be far more artistic than the 

 profile. Full and three-quarter faces were also placed on 

 shields, glass ornaments, walls, engraved stones, and in the 

 lacunaria or coffers of temples, (as at Baalbek, in later 

 Roman times,) as well as on medallions, and even on many 

 coins of the best periods, though on these last the face 

 was generally in profile. But this question is not important 

 in reference to the decoration of buildings. There is, how- 

 ever, another which may be noticed, as it is in some degree 

 connected with it ; and which has lately excited some atten- 

 tion. This is the colouring of statues by the Greeks. 



62. We have so long been accustomed to see white marble 

 statues, that we can scarcely be brought to believe they were 

 ever coloured by the Greeks : but it is not the less true ; and it 

 is not improbable that if they had only left to us the human 

 figure drawn in outline, some might have maintained that to 

 colour it in any picture representing a classical subjeot would be 

 meretricious, and that the severity of antique taste required it 

 to be in plain outline. It is, however, far from desirable that 

 the colouring of statues should be attempted at the present 

 clay ; none but the very first artists among the Greeks suc- 

 ceeded in it, and mediocrity in the most difficult branch of 



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