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Show 88 ICONOGRAPIIIO RESEAUCIIES nationalities.2 But, whilst you judiciously selected the most characteristic reliefs of Egypt and Assyria fl'om tho classical works of Chmnpollion, Rosollini, Lepsins, Tiotta, nnd JAtyard; all Rtt'nscan, Roman, Hindoo, and American antiquities were excluded from the "Typ s ;" and I felt somewhat disappointed when I found, tuat as to your Gt'oek representations you were altogether mistaken. You pubJiHhed, on tho whole, :five bu ts 3 belongiug strictly to tho times and nations of classical antiquity, but thoro is scarcely one amonO' them on which sound criticism could bestow an unconditional approval. . You may find that I am rather hard upon you, as even your critic m the Atltenmum 1J'1·anyais 4 o1)jeeted only to one of them. Still, am.i~ us NOT'I', amicus Gr:IDDON, sed magis arnica veritas; and I hope that If yon have tho pat10ncc to read my letter with attention you will yomsclvcs plead guilty. ' The busts which I am to review arc the alleged portraits of LYCURGu., the Spaetan legislator, of ALEXANDER the Great, of ERATosTflENE , of llANNIDAr,, and of.JunA I., Icing of Numidia. I. As to the great Lacedm~onian lawgiver, you borrowed his porFig. 1. tralt ft'om Pouqueville,5 who took it from Ennio Quirino Visconti.6 It cannot be traced farther back. The celebrated Italian arcbroologist, publishing that head of a marble statue in the Vatican, freely ackno~ledges that he has scarcely any author~ty for attributing it to Lycurgus, by saymg :that he tldnlcs the statue migltt be a p01:tra1t.of the famous one-eyed logislator,- masmuch as the conformation of the left eye and cheek is difrcront from the 1:ight side of the head; and, according to .h1m, such want of symmetry characterizes a man blind of one eye.7 I leave • lllumoubnch r~ad a lecture: De vttcrum arlificium anatomice ptritice laude limitanda, cele~ branda vero eorum 111 clwr~cle~c gcntilitio cxprimendo accuratione, at Gottingon, on the 19th of Maro~t, 1823, but unhapp1ly 1t never was published. Tho notioo in the Gotti?lflen Gelellrle .Anzetgen 1828 (p. 1241,) montions only that ho dwelt upon tho oorrootnoss of th tn.ti f J . o roprcsen-ons o nog~oes, cws, and Pers1ans, on ancient monuments; aud remarked that no offi ~~~~~f ~!~ngohau typo has ever boo~ found on thorn. Prichard devotes two pages (286 a!~ Rosolli ni'B lid .~olume), to the romnllls of. Egyptian painting and sculpture; but ho ignores 1 m. 8 wet • ~nd quotes from the nntlqu11ted D.lllNON and tho Description de l'Eg Jypes of Afankmd, p. 104 nnd 186. YP 1e . • A tlt.enamm_ Fra!lfait, Paris, 26 March 1864, p. 264. : Umvers ptt~oresque, Gr~ce, pl. 84 ;-T!Jpct, p. 104, fig. 4 .. Iconograplue grccque, I. pl. Vlii. 2. , I b ·a 181 f h . · .. I • P· o t o Mtlan odthon. ON IIUMAN H.ACES AND TIIEIR ART. 80 it altogether to your critical jud()'mont whether such an argument is suffici nt for baptizing the old statue and calling it Lycurgus, whilst the d f rmity of the fa c might be the result of the lumsin ss or inadvertence of the sculptor, or might represent any other half-fac d personage. But even had Visconti proved that tho effigy in question was really meant for Lycu rgus, being a copy of tho statues mention cl by I ausanias,8 still, tho features could not be taken for a real portmit, nor could they have any value for ethnology, since, impossible as it is to :fix the dato of Lycurgus accurately, it is univcl'sally agreed that he lived at tho close of the heroic and before tho dawn of tho historical ago, when art was nearly unknown to Grecco. A chaflm of at least three centuries separates him from the earliest r lief); and coins we possess. It is therefore preposterous to believe in portraits of J .. ycurgus in the present sense of the word. According'ly, Visconti admits tl1at the portrait in question was created(!)like that of IIomor,-on national tt'aditions by artistic imagination. Tile Grc ks, with their strono-ly developed feeling for beauty, wore not at all shocked by such ideal portraits; their artists, down to the time of Alexander the Macedon ian; and even beyond his epoch, did not care much for matcl'ial likeness, and woro only int nt upon making the expression of tho £ aturos answer to the traditional character of the person rcpl'cscntcd. Thus, for instance, they created tho fHgics of tho" seven sages," a1)d of .LEsoPus, which once adorned the Villa of Cassius, and now form one of tho chief attractions of the Vi !Ia Albani at Rome.9 Tho most celebrated of those imaginary portmits is tl1c magnificent bust of lloMEn,10 equally known in anliqnity and in modern times; for PliiJy!1 remarks, speaking of this custom, that "even o.fligics which do not exist, arc invented, and excite the desire to kn0w the features not transmitted, as is the case with Horner." Pausanlas proves that in his time there woro portraits of Ly mgus existing; of course invented in a similar way: but we may safbly state that, even the created effigies of tho old law-giver were not of a constant type. The Spartans, at the epoch of their complete subj ection to Rome, began to adorn their copper coins with tho head of Lycurgus, inscribing them with his name in order that no mistake should be possible; but Visconti, who published two of them, t?. says, that they do not resemble one another . Tllns we arrive at the conclusion that there is no certainty and but little probability about tho head published by you, as to its 1 PAUSANIAB, lib. iii. O. 14. 1 VISOONTI, Iconographic grecquc, 1 pl. ix. X. xi. XU. •• 'J'hc beRt of thorn is at tho Studj at Nnplcs; a good ono in tho Dt·itish Museum. 11 Ilisloria Naturce, XXXV. e 2. •• VlSOON'ri, Icon. gr., 1 pl. viii. 6, 6. |