Chapter III

, was a common palæstra motive.[2033] Despite certain portrait-like features, this statue may not represent an individual victor, but, like Myron’s great work, an athletic model. The words of Pliny,[2034] which mention one of the best-known works of Lysippos in antiquity—it heads the list in his account of the sculptor—as an athlete _destringentem se_, and his statement in another passage[2035] that Lysippos introduced a new canon into art _capita minora faciendo quam antiqui, corpora graciliora siccioraque, per quae proceritas signorum major videretur_, _i. e._, a canon of bodily proportions essentially different from that of Polykleitos, seemed to have their best illustration in the slender and graceful body and limbs, and noticeably small head of this statue. It was, therefore, though admittedly a Roman work, long regarded as a direct copy of the Lysippan original, and as faithfully representing his style in every detail.[2036] Such a view, of course, was founded entirely on circumstantial evidence, and could not survive any positive evidence to the contrary which might come to light in the future. G. F. Hill, in speaking of the insufficient evidence on which the _Apoxyomenos_ had been accepted as the key to Lysippan style, rightly remarks: “It is more scientific, until we acquire documentary evidence of excellent character, to classify our extant examples of ancient art as representing tendencies rather than men.”[2037] The Lysippan character of the Vatican statue had not been seriously attacked until the discovery of the _Agias_. Its original was certainly a work worthy of Lysippos. Its rhythm, proportions, and fine modeling have received praise of connoisseurs ever since its discovery. Its difficult pose had been remarkably well executed. While appearing at rest, the statue suggests vigorous action both by its supple limbs and the suppressed excitement indicated by the partly opened lips, an excitement befitting a victorious athlete. Perhaps it was the difficulty of such a pose that best explains why the _Apoxyomenos_ has left no other copy.[2038] The very excellence of the Vatican statue prejudiced us in favor of regarding it as an illustration of Lysippos’ ideal of bodily proportions. But we really knew very little of the original _Apoxyomenos_, only what we gathered from Pliny, that Lysippos made such a statue and that it was carried to Rome by M. Agrippa and was set up in front of his Thermæ, whence it was removed by the enamored Tiberius to his bed-chamber, only to be restored when the populace remonstrated. As for the proportions of the supposed copy in question, they only prove that this statue goes back to an original which was not earlier than Lysippos, but not that it was by the master himself.[2039] The discovery of the _Agias_ showed us at last on what slender foundations our theory had been built. Despite certain well-marked similarities in the pose, proportions, and relatively small head—characteristics which were not even exclusively Lysippan, since they are just as prominent in certain other works, _e. g._, in the warriors of the Mausoleion frieze—between the _Agias_ and the _Apoxyomenos_, nevertheless just as striking differences appear, which make it difficult to keep both statues as examples of the artistic tendency of one and the same artist, even if we should assign them to different periods of his career.

THE AGIAS AND THE APOXYOMENOS COMPARED, AND THE STYLE OF LYSIPPOS.

These differences are most apparent in the surface modeling and facial expression of the two works. In the _Agias_ the muscles are not over-emphasized in detail, but show the simple observation of nature characteristic of artists who worked before the scientific study of anatomy at the Museum of Alexandria had reacted upon sculpture. In the _Apoxyomenos_, on the other hand, we see an intentional display of the new learning in the labored and detailed treatment of the muscles, which disclose a knowledge of anatomy unknown before the Hellenistic age. This academic treatment, culminating later in such realistic works as the _Laocoön_ and the _Farnese Herakles_, can hardly have antedated the beginning of the third century B. C., when anatomy was studied by the physicians Herophilos and Erasistratos, a date after the close of the activity of Lysippos. We see no trace of this influence in the _Agias_. Moreover, the face of the latter discloses the intense expression, which is elsewhere seen only in works supposed to be by, or influenced by, Skopas, which recalls what Plutarch[2040] said of Lysippos’ portraits of Alexander, that they reproduced his masculine and leonine air (αὐτοῦ τὸ ἀρρενωπὸν καὶ λεοντῶδες); for a comparison of this face with that of the _Apoxyomenos_, which exhibits the lifelessness and lack of expression so characteristic of many early Hellenistic works, makes it still more evident that we must be on our guard against assuming that both works are representative of the same sculptor. The essential differences in physical type and artistic execution between the two statues have been well summarized by K. T. Frost in a letter published by Prof. Percy Gardner in the latter’s treatment of the same subject.[2041] After a careful analysis of these differences, Frost closes by saying: “It is difficult to believe that the two statues represent works by the same artist; it is not only the type of man, but the way in which that type is expressed which forms the contrast.” He compares the _Apoxyomenos_ with the _Borghese Warrior_ (Fig. 43) as true products of the Hellenistic age.

When we consider these differences between the two statues, we see that our judgment of Lysippan art must depend on how we interpret them. We may either flatly reject the _Apoxyomenos_ and put the _Agias_ in its place as representing the norm of Lysippan art, or keep the _Apoxyomenos_ and reject the _Agias_ as evidence; or lastly we may keep both as characteristic works of two different periods in the artistic career of Lysippos, explaining the differences as the result of influence or of the lapse of years. A recent writer, to be sure, has cut the Gordian knot by rejecting both statues, and placing the _Apoxyomenos_ of the Uffizi—which we have treated at length in a preceding chapter (Pl. 12)—as the key to our knowledge of the art of Lysippos.[2042] But such a solution of the problem raises even more difficulties. Long before the _Agias_ came to light some critics, indeed, had doubted whether the _Apoxyomenos_ really represented the work of Lysippos, as its Hellenistic character seemed evident. Thus, in 1877, Ulrich Koehler,[2043] following a still earlier judgment,[2044] had come to the conclusion that the Vatican statue was only a free reproduction of Lysippos’ masterpiece and attributed its Hellenistic characteristics to the Roman copyist; but even yet the school which long recognized the _Apoxyomenos_ as the norm of Lysippos has its supporters,[2045] though many archæologists have now supplanted the _Apoxyomenos_ by the _Agias_.[2046] Others, not willing to renounce the _Apoxyomenos_ as evidence, accept both it and the _Agias_ as characteristic works of the master, appealing to the length of his career to explain the differences, and suggesting that in his youth Lysippos was under the influence of Skopas, but later in life attained independence, and followed a more anatomical rendering for his athlete statues.[2047] However, despite the fact that other artists must have influenced Lysippos,[2048] the _Agias_ can not be shown to be a youthful work of his, nor can the special influence of Skopas be shown to have been that of master on pupil, but rather of one great master on another and equally great contemporary. The difficulty about penetrating the obscurity surrounding Lysippos comes largely from the fact that he borrowed traits from several of his predecessors and contemporaries. The influence of Polykleitos, Skopas, and Praxiteles, and especially of the last two, as Homolle emphasized in his study of the Daochos group,[2049] can be certainly traced in the _Agias_. Fräulein Bieber, in a recent article,[2050] while denying that Lysippos had anything to do with the Delphian group, tries to prove that one figure in it shows the influence of Praxiteles, another that of Polykleitos, and a third that of Skopas. She believes that the sculptor of the _Agias_ had seen the original bronze statue, the work of Lysippos, which stood in Pharsalos. However, we may leave any such conclusion to one side, and judge between the _Agias_ and the _Apoxyomenos_ solely on the merits of the two statues.

The differences between them appear to us too great to be reconciled on any such principles as those just rehearsed, for their style and technique seem to represent two distinct periods of art. If one is to be rejected, the connection of the _Agias_ with Lysippos certainly rests on better evidence than does the _Apoxyomenos_. By separating them completely, it is possible both to assign to Lysippos the early date which other evidence points to, and to remove the _Apoxyomenos_ entirely from the fourth century B. C., thus explaining its later modeling, comparatively expressionless features, body-build (which shows the use of three planes, instead of two), and other Hellenistic details. We should, then, see in its original a work not by Lysippos at all, but by some pupil or later member of his school, a work retaining merely traces of the style of the master. In thus eliminating the _Apoxyomenos_ we are justified in following Homolle’s lead in assigning the statue of Agias to Lysippos, in spite of arguments which have been adduced against attributing it to Lysippos and in spite of recent criticism of the inscriptions of the Delphian bases, by which Wolters tries to prove that the inscription on the base of the statue of Agias, and consequently the _Agias_ itself, antedate the inscription and dedication at Pharsalos.[2051] We may, therefore, until further discoveries prove the contrary, consider it as the centre of our treatment of that sculptor. Whether the _Apoxyomenos_ is to be explained as emanating from the immediate environment of Lysippos, or is to be regarded as a work illustrating the last phase of his development, or the innovation of another master—in any case it seems to us clearly to belong to an age essentially different from that which conceived the _Agias_.[2052]

As the _Agias_ is a statue of a victor in the pankration, we can learn from it how Lysippos represented such an athlete. In giving up the _Apoxyomenos_, we must also give up statues of athletes which have hitherto been assigned to Lysippos on the basis of their resemblance to it, and the future ascription of statues of this class must be based on stylistic resemblances to the statue of Agias. Thus, for example, we should give up the statue of a youth in Berlin, and the two statues of athletes represented in lunging attitudes in Dresden, which Furtwaengler, on the basis of the _Apoxyomenos_, believed were copies of originals by Lysippos,[2053] and the Roman male head in Turin, published by A. J. B. Wace,[2054] whose original is somewhat later than that of the _Apoxyomenos_. On the basis of the _Agias_, on the other hand, we may regard as Lysippan the statue of an athlete in Copenhagen,[2055] and perhaps the Parian marble statue of an athlete from the Palazzo Farnese now in the British Museum,[2056] with copies in Paris and Rome.[2057] This latter statue Furtwaengler ascribed to the school of Kalamis of the fifth century B. C., on account of the similarity of its style to that of the _Apollo-on-the-Omphalos_ (Fig. 7B) and of its motive to that of the _Lansdowne Herakles_ (Fig. 71 and Pl. 30); however, A. H. Smith finds it very similar to the _Agias_, and so rightly refers it to the fourth century B. C.

THE HEAD FROM OLYMPIA.

Impressed by its remarkable likeness to the head of the _Agias_, I hazarded the opinion some years ago,[2058] that the much discussed Pentelic marble head from Olympia (Frontispiece and Figure 69)[2059] was Lysippan, and attempted to bring it into relation with the statue of the Akarnanian pancratiast (whose name I restored as Philandridas), which Pausanias[2060] says was the work of Lysippos. Since then, after a careful revision of the evidence, this earlier opinion has become conviction, and I now have no hesitancy in expressing the belief that in this vigorous marble head we have to do with an original work by Lysippos himself. It will be our task briefly to rehearse the reasons for making such an ascription, despite the serious and weighty objections which might be raised against it.

[Illustration: FIG. 69.—Marble Head, from Olympia. Museum of Olympia.]

At first this head was ascribed with surprising unanimity to the school of Praxiteles,[2061] and subsequently, after the discovery of the Tegea heads, with almost equal unanimity to that of Skopas. Treu, who first published the head,[2062] pointed out its near relationship to the _Hermes_ of Praxiteles, which appeared to him to be obvious, notwithstanding the injured condition of the chin, nose, mouth, and brows. He found the general proportions, the shape of the cranium and forehead, and the form of the cheeks and mouth the same in both, while the differences, such as the deeper cut and wider opened eyes with their γοργόν expression, the hair, and the fact that the head is harder, leaner, and bonier than that of the _Hermes_, were all explained by the different character given to the statue of a victor or Herakles. Many other archæologists, as Boetticher,[2063] Laloux and Monceaux,[2064] and Furtwaengler,[2065] have also seen sure signs of the hand of Praxiteles or his school in the graceful attitude, delicate chiseling, and finish of the work. Still others,[2066] however, found every characteristic of Skopas in this head. Even Treu in his later treatment of the head found it more Skopaic than Praxitelian, and yet, by a careful analysis,[2067] he conclusively showed that the formation of the eyes, the opening of the mouth, and the treatment of the hair were so different in the heads from Tegea (and especially in that of the _Herakles_, Fig. 73) as to preclude the possibility of assigning them and the head from Olympia to the same sculptor, and so declared for some independent sculptor among the contemporaries of Skopas. However, he did not see Lysippos in this allied but independent artist, though he admitted the resemblance of the head in question to that of the _Agias_, as also Homolle,[2068] Mahler,[2069] and other critics have done.

THE OLYMPIA HEAD AND THAT OF THE AGIAS.

A detailed comparison of this head with that of the _Agias_ will show wherein the wonderful resemblance—so striking at first glance—consists and will disclose its Lysippan character. Neither head is a portrait, nor even individualized; the _Agias_ could be no portrait, for Agias was the great-grandfather of Daochos, who enlisted the services of his contemporary Lysippos in erecting his statue, and he won his victory in the pankration more than a century before this statue was set up.[2070] A glance at the head from Olympia also clearly discloses its ideal character; for it is no portrait of Philandridas, but the victor κατ’ ἐξοχήν in the pankration. The small head of the _Agias_—under life-size—first arrests attention as the chief characteristic of the whole statue and (taken with the other proportions of the body) as the chief mark of its Lysippan origin. As Homolle says, it is not that small heads are not found outside the school of Lysippos or before his day—for Myron can furnish examples of them—but it is only with Lysippos and after him that we see a conscious intention of having the proportions thus reduced. Now the head from Olympia is also less than life-size,[2071] but as the head alone is preserved, we can only assume that the proportions it bore to the body were similar to those we see in the statue of Agias. The conformation of the crania of both is, as in Attic works, round, with small, only slightly projecting occiputs, as opposed to the squareness of Polykleitan heads, which are longer from front to back and flatter on top—showing how Lysippos in this respect departed from the creator of the _Doryphoros_. This cranial conformation is almost identical in the two heads, as is clearly shown in Fig. 70, where one is drawn in profile over the other.

[Illustration: FIG. 70.—Profile Drawings of the Heads of the _Agias_ and the _Philandridas_.]

The head of the _Agias_ is turned slightly upward and to the left. Treu found traces of the use of a file on the back of the neck of the head from Olympia, which show from their position, what also was clear from the muscles of the throat, that this head also was inclined somewhat to the left and upward, possibly more than that of the _Agias_. The outlines of the face—lean and bony in both—are oval, in the head from Olympia somewhat broader, rounder, and fleshier toward the chin. In both the forehead is remarkably low, with a low depression or crease in the middle, and with a prominently projecting superciliary arcade, which breaks the continuous line from forehead to nose very perceptibly. This line is concave above and below, but convex at the projection itself, though this is less prominent in the _Agias_. The powerful framing of the eyes, which are deep-set and thrown into heavy shadows by the projecting bony structure of the brows and the overhanging masses of flesh, the eyeballs slightly raised and peering eagerly into the far distance, the slight upward inclination of the head, and the prominent forehead drawn together, all combine to give both heads (though young and vigorous) a pensive, even a sad look of heroic dignity, a look seemingly of one who takes no joy nor pleasure in victory, though it is not mournful. This humid and pensive expression was doubtless a characteristic of works of Lysippos—it was, as we know, present in his portraits of Alexander—but he did not treat it with as great intensity as did Skopas.

The eyeballs in both heads are strongly arched, though the inner angles are not so deep as in Skopaic heads; the raised upper lids form a symmetrically narrow and sharply defined border over the eyeball, and in neither head is this lid covered by a fold of skin at the outer corners, as in the Tegea heads; the mass of flesh at the outer corners is heavier in the head from Olympia, and the expression of the eyes is more free and defiant than in the more meditative _Agias_. In both, the cheek bones are high and prominent. The elegant contour of the lips of the _Agias_ is wholly wanting in the head from Olympia, in which the lips are broken off, like the nose and the chin, but it is clear that the lips were slightly parted, just showing the teeth—not, however, as in the Tegea examples, as if the breath were being drawn with great effort. The look of pensiveness is also increased by the open lips. The contour of the jawbone is not so visible as in the _Agias_, where it is clearly discernible beneath the closely drawn skin, giving the face a look of greater leanness, as of an athlete in perfect training.

In both heads the swollen and battered ears, though small, are prominent, and in both the hair is closely cropped, as becomes the athlete. The hair of the _Agias_ does not show so much expression as is displayed in that of some Lysippan heads, nor the fine detail we should expect from Pliny’s statement that Lysippos made improvements in the rendering of the hair[2072]—for it is in great measure only sketched out. In Lysippan portraits of Alexander the hair is generally expressively treated, and this is often the case in early Hellenistic heads.[2073] However, we should not expect an elaborate treatment of the hair in the statue of a pancratiast. The head from Olympia also shows great simplicity in this regard. As in Skopaic heads, the hair is fashioned into little ringlets ruffled straight up from the forehead in flat relief, but here the curls are shorter and more tense. It covers the temples and surrounds the ears as in the _Agias_, but it is not, as there, bounded by a round, floating line across the forehead, nor divided into little tufts modeled in relief radiating in concentric circles from the top of the head. While lacking in detail, the hair of the _Agias_ is treated carefully, and with the greatest variety. Narrow bands, perhaps the insignia of victory, despite their small size, encircle both heads; in the _Agias_ the band is dexterously used to heighten the effect of variety in the hair by alternately flattening and swelling it here and there. In neither head is there any sign of the use of the drill to work out the tufts of the hair; only the chisel was used.[2074]

Finally, the whole expression of these two ideal heads is one of force and energy, of heroic dignity tempered by pensiveness and pathos, which is, in the head from Olympia at least, even a little dramatic. Both heads, while ideal, show close observation of nature in modeling and expression; and both show the predilection of Lysippos for types in which force and energy predominate, and his indifference to the softer and more delicate types of manly beauty so characteristic of his contemporary, Praxiteles.

In the foregoing comparison, we have tacitly assumed that this marble head is from an athlete statue, and, moreover, that it, as the _Agias_, represents a victor in the pankration, though many have seen in it the representation not of a victor, but of a youthful Herakles.[2075] The swollen ears and the band in the hair might pass equally well for either, just as the fact that it was unearthed near the ruins of the Great Gymnasion (if it were necessary to assume that the statue once stood there) might be adduced as evidence for either interpretation; for statues of athletes as well as those of Herakles and Hermes (as we have shown in Ch. II)[2076] adorned palæstræ and gymnasia. That the head is of marble and slightly under life-size seems to lend some support also to the belief that it is a fragment of a statue of Herakles, on the assumption that statues of victors in the Altis were uniformly of bronze, an assumption, however, not supported by the facts, as will be shown in