Page:History of Art in Phrygia, Lydia, Caria and Lycia.djvu/297

 SCULPTURE AND NUMISMATICS. 281 If under the circumstances we could not expect to see figures flung athwart the face of the stony cliff, we had hopes that the tombs of Lydia would yield small objects, such as bronzes and terra-cottas ; those that have been opened, however, have revealed nothing of the kind, whilst the small figures sold by dealers of curios at Constantinople and Smyrna are almost always of un- certain origin. Reference was made a little while ago to a quad- rangular stone covered with writing on three of its faces, 1 which was discovered at Ak-Hissar (ancient Thyatira). On the fourth face was incised a man's figure, whose head and bust are completely obliterated ; the legs, which are inwardly bent and wide apart, are alone preserved, 2 so that little is to be made out of the monument. Coins are the only instances left to us from which to obtain some notion of the way the Lydians understood and rendered the human form. The pieces in electrum, divided into two different systems, are the oldest creations of the coiner's art in Lydia ; both of which had their origin in Mesopotamia. In the one which is generally called Babylonian, the unit of weight is a mine of 505 grammes, divisible into 60 parts of 8 grammes 415 c. each ; in the other, known as Graeco- Asiatic or Phoenician, the mine is equal to 1010 grammes, and its sixtieth part is 1 6 grammes 13 c. The lighter mine would seem to have been introduced in the interior of Asia Minor, by the Syro-Cappa- docians and the Phrygians ; whilst the heavier mine was carried to the coasts 'and the islands of the yEgean, and thence to continental Greece, by the Phoenicians. We do not propose entering into details as to the expedients which followed the in- vention of coinage, and which were taken up by the Lydians and lonians in order to fix the relation between the three precious metals employed in succession in the issue of money. Any one interested in the subject should consult a standard work in which are duly set forth the different cuts that were adopted for each of the metals, and the simultaneous introduction of the sexagesimal north-east of Kulah, on the Ghedissu ; that is to say, in the district formerly called Maeonia. The sculptures are descriptive of religious scenes connected with the cultus of Atys. In the one he is seen under a pine, a tree sacred to him ; in the next he is surrounded by a pack of hounds ; whilst in the third, he is borne in the arms of his worshippers, who are about to lay him in the tomb. 1 History of Art, torn. v. p. 242, note i. 2 A squeeze due to M. S. Reinach has been deposited in the Bibliotheque de 1'Institut.