the ancients, evident and palpable proofs of the prevailing taste of which I have spoken. It is at the present day confirmed by the works of statuary which were employed in the monuments of architecture, from the example of two of the most beautiful edifices which remain of ancient art, the Temple of Minerva and that of Theseus at Athens, which still preserve manifest traces of the application of colours which were laid on the sculptures in basso-relievo of these two temples. A similar proof has resulted from the discovery of those curious bassi-relievi of Selinantum, which, having suffered less from the injury of the weather, also present this peculiarity in the most manifest manner. It has been in my power to see confirmed at Agrigentum on some fragments discovered by Mr. Hittorff, the primitive application of colour which had been used on the sculptures belonging to the decorations of these edifices. It will ever be considered an authenticated and indisputable fact, that at the most beautiful period of Greek art, the edifices of the first order were adorned with sculptures, if not painted in all the extent of the word, at least coloured, so as to render prominent some architectural parts, and to make other parts stand out conspicuous, to produce, in fine, by a happy mixture of the effects of colour and of form, an impression of richness, of brilliancy, and of variety, far superior, in our opinion, to that which results from the use of a single material, naturally cold and monotonous. But it is in the works of statuary made to remain isolated as statues, that this practice of the ancients has been exhibited to us in the least equivocal manner, however unwilling we may be to recognise it. On this point many testimonies, and many allusions, are to be frequently met with in their writings; but what is more decisive, there are monuments which prove this almost universal custom. I shall not mention those charming little figures in terra-cotta of pure Greek workmanship, which are found by hundreds in Sicily and in Greece, and so few of which are as yet in our collections; figures which present all the details of the dress and toilet of the women, with a variety and with a display of colour of which we can form no idea; I shall not mention these, I say, because the proportion and the nature itself of these statues does not admit of considering them as productions of the severe and simple style. Neither shall I mention other small statues of the same kind, employed in the decoration of the interior of buildings, such as the

H

Atlantes of the Thermæ at Pompeii, which, as they were destined to take a place in buildings entirely painted, could not but be included in the same system. But on the very monuments of the highest order, how many traces do we not find, although defaced from day to day by time and negligence, of this use of colours, the object of which was to correct the coldness of the marble, to temper the stiffness of the stone, without however going so far as to produce that false and coarse imitation, which deviates from the domain of art. The Pallas of Velletri, the famous Amazon of the Vatican, and the beautiful Diana of Versailles, received on several of the nude parts, as well as on the drapery, an application of colours for the purpose I have mentioned. The Venus de' Medici had the hair gilt, and earrings fixed on, probably, also, in gold. The Minerva of Herculaneum had, on several parts, gilding so thick that it came off in scales. The small Diana of Herculaneum exhibits still more perceptibly than any other ancient statue, the application of different colours on different parts of its drapery, and if it will be allowed me to advance my own testimony, I can affirm that on a great many of the most beautiful ancient statues which have not been noticed with this view, but which I have examined with the greatest care, especially the beautiful Caryatides of the Villa Albani, at Rome, the use of differently coloured tints can be distinctly discovered, which made certain parts of the drapery stand out, and set off the brilliancy of the flesh and the beauty of the nude; in fine, gave the marble almost the colour and appearance of flesh, and produced in addition to this, the immense advantage of preserving the marble, of protecting the surface from the effects of humidity which wears away and destroys the material, an advantage which can be fully appreciated by comparing the most beautiful ancient statues, such as the Apollo and the Mercury Belvidere, the Venus de' Medici, the Hercules Farnese, which still, as we may say, retain their flesh untouched, with many modern statues, the surfaces of which are stained, or rubbed off, or destroyed in so many different ways.*

*However powerfully R. Rochette may argue in favour of polychromatic sculpture, in our opinion sculpture can never be other than form in its purest ideal; and any application of colour which would detract from the purity and ideality of this purest of the arts, can never be agreeable to our taste. The

I must claim your indulgence for all those digressions, which, in appearance, carry me so far from the principal object of my researches. I had as yet barely reached in the history of Greek art the age of Daedalus, and here I find myself almost at our own age, allowing myself to follow a succession of ideas which involuntarily spring one from another. But this is an inevitable inconvenience in a lecture which scarcely ever allows us to follow that methodical order, that rigorous deduction which ought to be found in a written composition, and it is also a part of the nature of the subject of which I treat, and which consists, as I have already had occasion to remark, less in presenting a complete and connected history of art, than in offering some general views on its genius. Let us nevertheless endeavour after this digression, to return to the point where we left off, I mean the age of Daedalus, and in order to return to our subject at once, and to sum up in a single word, let us here consider it as established, that the system of polychromatic sculpture, such as it existed among the ancients, depended on the prevailing custom of primitive art, of dressing painted statues in real drapery, and thus obtaining an illusion the more effective, as the imitation was more rude, and art itself more imperfect.

In treating of Daedalus, it is not necessary to say that I shall speak but little of Dædalus himself. His history, as it is related by Diodorus Siculus, is almost entirely composed of fables, which have already been considered as such by Simonides, and it would evince bad taste in us to show ourselves more credulous at the present day than at the time of Pindar. The name itself of Daedalus was not a proper name,

modern taste for polychromatic sculpture is obviously but a returning to the primitive imperfection of art when an attempt was made to produce illusion, in order to please the uneducated taste of the vulgar. The great masters of art never coloured their marble statues. The Cnidian Venus of Praxiteles was colourless. Müller observes that "colour in sculpture operates with so much the less advantage the more it tries to approach nature, because in this endeavour to represent the body completely, the want of life only strikes us the more disagreeably. Hence the repulsiveness of wax figures; the illusion aimed at is precisely what here revolts." We must also remark an inconsistency in R. Rochette, for if he censures the age of the Antonines for reproducing Egyptian statues in the style of a primitive and imperfect art, why should he defend the taste for polychromatic sculpture which he proves was derived from the rude contrivances of early and imperfect art, to produce illusion by painting statues and covering them with real drapery.— Note of Translator.

as I have already remarked it was a generic name, which designated every kind of artist; and it is probably in this sense that it was employed by Homer in a celebrated passage of the Iliad.*

But there were some historical facts connected with this name, as well as some real monuments which were supposed to have been produced by this personage; and it is under this two-fold view, that I must consider Dædalus, that is to say, as art itself in its primitive form and in its first school. The greater number of traditions represent Dædalus as an Athenian, of the race of Erechtheus, the contemporary and near relation of Theseus; the same traditions represent him as going to Crete, then to Sicily and Italy, and even to Sardinia.

These fables are evidently connected with ancient Phoenician traditions which point out the same places, I mean Attica, Crete, Sicily, Sardinia, as the principal points occupied by Phoenician adventurers, consequently they trace under the name of Dædalus, and in the very course of his travels, the path which Phoenician arts and trade followed towards the west of Europe, taking Attica as the point of departure, which was certainly one of their most ancient, and one of their principal establishments. Fable here, therefore, takes the place of history, which is far better than when it throws a veil over it, and, to speak truly, fable here is in reality but history, under a poetic costume, as it is everywhere in the first annals of a people. We must therefore understand, under the name of Dædalus, a school of artists, probably Athenians, who disseminated at different periods, and in different places, though not far distant the one from the other, some knowledge and some mechanical practices derived from a Phoenician source. The works attributed to Dædalus, fully confirm this inference. At the head of these works figure the Bull and the Labyrinth of Crete, monuments which manifestly bear an oriental impress. The Labyrinth of Crete was imitated from that of Egypt, according to the formal testimony of an ancient

writer.

Subterranean constructions of the same kind existed in Italy at Clusium and at Cumæ, in Sicily at Agrigentum, with which the name of Dædalus was also connected. The connecting link between all these traditions is very striking, and the

* Iliad xviii. 693.