Page:History of Art in Phœnicia and Its Dependencies Vol 2.djvu/353

 CERAMICS IN CYPRUS. 325 princes and other great people ; he had sometimes studied abroad. It may even have been that some Greek of Attica or Ionia was summoned to the island by one of its petty kings, there to create works which must have had their effect upon the native artists. But the potter was a simple artizan. He did not quit the roof under which his father had taught him the family trade ; there he turned out his modest creations and sold them to every comer. Any rich amateur who wanted fine figured vases imported them from Athens, while the crowd of humble clients were destitute of that love for innovation which forced Greek art along the path of development. Under such conditions, Cypriot pottery, after enjoying its period of invention and progress, ended in obscure routine, and that at about the time when the art was elsewhere covering itself with glory. Thenceforward it was a local industry, serving nothing but the daily consumption of the natives ; I do not know that vases of Cypriot manufacture have ever been found outside the limits of the island. Being at least as conservative as those who frequented his shop, the potter repeated down to the last days of antiquity those models which he found easy of sale. Some vases which seem very ancient at the first glance are really quite modern, speaking compara- tively, as we can tell by certain details. In the British Museum l there is a vase of red earth decorated with black stripes, to which at first sight a very remote date might be assigned. There is no glaze ; the dull tones, both of ground and decoration, the sim- plicity of the ornamental motive all have that stamp of archaism which seems so unmistakable. But in front of the vase, on its shoulder, is perched a small female figure, freely modelled in high relief, which can certainly not be older than the time of the heirs of Alexander. The potter was four or five centuries behind the statue maker ; the latter kept pace with the times, the former lagged behind them, cumbered with the traditions of his ancestors. The excavations themselves confirm the conclusions to which we have been led by our study of the vases ; the most recent ex- plorer in the island, Mr. Ohnefalsch-Richter, remarks that the old Cypriot pottery, with its fantastic shapes and ornamental motives so far removed from Greek taste, is completely wanting in Sala- minia, where he carried out some important excavations on behalf of the English government. On the other hand this very distinct 1 Cypriot Saloon, Case 32 (1884).