Page:History of Art in Persia.djvu/470

 446 History of Art in Antiquity. r : : i 1 w V ' sculpture does not exhibit those startling dislocations, limbs so ill attached to the body as to appear broken, blemishes that so often offend the eye in the paintings of Kgypt, and sometimes even in her sculpture.' Then, too, it is free from violent exaggeration in the pro- jection of the bones and muscles, which in the older work of Assyria, the bas-reliefs of Asur- nat-Sirpal for example, results in obvious de- formity. Here the figures, no matter their posture, are invariably, as a painter would say. well shaken together, and the form, whether covered or uncovered, is true to nature ; its pro- portions are strictly kept, and neither reduced nor added to. Nor is this all ; other features, too, prove dexterity of hand and improvement in the art under notice. The ^^^^^H figures exhibited on the r^^'^'^^^H sculptured slabs of As- _ Syrian palaces nearly Ik. ^JV^i^ii^^^ilH always present a plane ^^^k. surface whereon the dc- ^^^C^--*-.i-»«sc- tails are incised, whilst the edge that surrounds the wrought space is cut ' //is/, o/ /ir/, tom. ii. Fi^ts. 13. 16, 91, 98, elc. Flo. 215. — Persepolis. Hypostyle hall of Xerxes fias-rclicf. From cast in tlic Louvre. Digitized by Google