Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 2.djvu/177

 FIGURES OF DIVINITIES. 155 necropolis of Amathus ; l but if we look at it carefully we find in the first place that the action of the arms is quite different from that of the Cnidian Venus. The left hand presses the left breast, while the right hand is placed on the large and protuberant stomach. All that we can gather from this is an allusion to approaching maternity, showing the figure to be merely a goddess of fertility. But examples have been pointed to in which the resemblance is much closer, in which the motive is essentially the same as in the great masterpiece of Cnidus. A certain figure in the Louvre has FIG. 105. Terra-cotta statuette of unknown origin. Height 8 inches. Louvre. been published and described by one of the masters of contemporary archeology as the P/tcenician prototype of the Venus de Medicis* But Curtius was misled by imperfect information. The museum catalogue says nothing as to the place where the figure in question (Fig. 105) was found, and there is no reason to assign it a Phoenician 1 CESNOLA, Cyprus, p. 275. The woodcut given by Cesnola is so poor that we have not cared to reproduce it here, even as a piece of evidence. 2 Das Phxnikische urbild der Medidschen Venus, article by E. ( Archaologische Zeitung, 1869, p. 63.