Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 2.djvu/318

 292 HISTORY OF ART IN PHOENICIA AND ITS DEPENDENCIES. comparatively modern, was made, the love for novelty, pushed even to affectation, of which we have already spoken, had not died away. As in the vessels covered with bosses pierced for strings, and in those modelled into the shapes of animals, an effort which not seldom overleaps itself may be recognized. If these Cypriot potters had been left to themselves, they would have tried, no doubt, like those of Thera and Mycense, to utilize the national flora for the decoration of their works. But in Cyprus I can find nothing corresponding to this stage of art else- where. When geometrical forms, like those encountered at FIG. 225. Vessel in shape of a goat. 1 Alambra, ceased to be sufficient ; when a taste arose for ornament into which living things could be introduced, the native potter turned, unhappily for himself, to models imported from without instead of to nature. Upon objects brought in from Egypt he found the lotus bud and flower universal, upon those sent by Asia he saw six-and eight-pointed rosettes as well as sinuous palmettes and those complex flourishes of which Assyria seems to have been so fond. And all these were used together on the composite creations of Phoenician industry. The temptation was too hard 1 From the Catalogue Barre. Height 6 inches ; length 6f inches.