Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 2.djvu/219

 MEN. 195 figure, and to discuss what it teaches ; but although it is the faith- ful portrait of a Greek hoplite, both material and workmanship are Cypriot. On his way back from one of those campaigns which, from the time of Nebuchadnezzar to that of Psammeticus, carried Greek mercenaries as far east as the Euphrates valley and as far south as the second cataract on the Nile, some Greek soldier had visited the temples of Cyprus, had paid his devotions, and had left a record of his piety in the shape of this statuette. The FIG. 130. Statuette of a soldier, in terra-cotta. Actual size. riot Collection. archaeologist meets with many surprises of the kind in Cyprus, which is owing to its situation and the part it played in antiquity. There Greece and the East came into contact at a very early hour ; they freely elbowed each other at those brilliant and sensuous festivities in which merchants and fighting-men of every race, the one sea-tossed and weary with travel, the other worn by long campaigns, came to pass a few days in which sensual pleasure and religious emotion were about equally combined.