622 POLYCHROMY IN GREEK .STATUARY. 



and preserve it altogether." The accounts of expenses enumerate all 

 the objects and ingredients that were employed — sponges ; niter, doubt- 

 less for the washing of the statues and freeing it from dust when the 

 question arose of refreshing the colors; white, carefully purified oil, 

 wax, a stuff made of flax ; finally a rose perfume, a very natural 

 refinement when the marble represents "a statue that is to be wor- 

 shiped and placed in a sanctuary." This operation was often repeated, 

 and the duty of presiding at it devolved upon the officials of the tem- 

 ple. An inscription on the Ptoi'on has preserved for us a statement of 

 accounts made by one of the administrators of the temple of Apollo; 

 it mentions, among others, a sum spent for the keeping of the statues 

 and the removal of the ydvGoffis. 1 It was still in use in the Koinan 

 period. Plutarch speaks of artists in marble who repair broken parts 

 and restore them; he also mentions this fact that the first act of the 

 censors, when they entered upon their duties, was to adjudge to the 

 lowest bidder the feeding of the sacred geese on the capitol and the 

 yavGoffis of the statue of Jupiter Capitolinus, because "the vermilion 

 with which it had been the custom to coat the old statues very quickly 

 underwent a change." 



Thus very clear statements in writing justify us in supposing that 

 this restoration was a treatment with wax, a transparent rubbing in, 

 which protects the painted parts and the gildings, giving to the naked 

 parts a soft sheen, a brightness resembling that of ivory, and satisfy- 

 ing the eye by softening too striking contrasts, while presenting to the 

 sight nothing but skillfully managed transitions. But is the result 

 really secured if the whole is nothing but a treatment without colors'? 

 The purified wax, of which Vitruvius speaks, the "white oil" which 

 the inscriptions of Delos mention, can hardly have any coloring virtue, 

 nor will they suffice to give warmth to the tone of the marble. This 

 question also has been much discussed, and two suggestions have been 

 made that are still open : Either, owing to a special preparation, the 

 wax was giving a kind of yellowish tonality to the marble, or it was 

 applied upon a very slight glazing, doing the duty of coloring matter. 

 This latter hypothesis has been advocated by Mr. G-. Treu, 2 and it must 

 be admitted that it rests upon facts. The head in the British Museum 

 lets us perceive a colored glazing beneath the treatment with wax, and 

 this is therefore the proper place to recall that transparent rubbing in, 

 which was observed upon the clouds on the u Sarcophagus of Alexan- 

 der." It is, of course, easily understood that in most instances so very 

 slight a glazing should have left no traces, and that Greek marbles 

 show us only vestiges of opaque tones that have greater consistency. 

 The restoration of so fragile, so fugitive a coloring remains a matter of 



'Bulletin de correspondance helle'nique, 1890, page 185. Article by Mr. Holleaux. 

 Tiiu: Sollen wir unsere Statuen bemalen ? and Jahrbuch des arcb. Instituts, 

 IV, 1889, page 18, and ft'. Mr. Paul Girard adopts the same opiniou in tbe chapter 

 Avhich he devotes to polychromy in La Peinture antique, page 283. 



