Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/217

 174 Primitive Greece: Mycenian Art. cognition. But it is not so in reality. The first idea that comes to man, when the sense for plastic art awakes in him, is to copy the outline of the shadows which bodies project on the wall. He does not stop there. Ere long, in order to accentuate and give more importance to the silhouette, the features of the face, the points of attachment of limb and muscle, the draping of the figure are indicated ; in a word, they are worked up and made to stand out from the background. In this process we have low- relief reduced to its simplest expression, as it was practised by nations with whom art never grew to full maturity. Such would be the bas-reliefs that cover miles of walls in the palaces of Assyria, which, thanks to the simplicity of the output, may be accomplished with extreme rapidity, although interlarded with a great abundance and variety of detail. This very elementary process can dispense with the consummate knowledge demanded by low-relief such as we find it in the Grecian art of the fifth century B.C., and above all in the Italian Renaissance, exempli- fied in the doors of the Baptistery at Florence. Nevertheless, even in a rudimentary stage, the artist can show how far he has a feeling for movement and form. This the sculptor of Mycenae and he of Nineveh have both done ; we shall see what brilliant qualities are displayed in the best works of the former. As with nationalities whose education is not sufficiently advanced to enable the artist to take up indifferently any subject that may attract his fancy, here also the number of the themes upon which this art exercised itself is very small. Though conscious that he had not so much as learnt the rudi- ments of his craft, man at an early date desired to have domestic idols that should not only protect his abode and his grave, but amulets to be worn about his person. When, after countless trial pieces, he succeeded in rendering the human form, in a somewhat less summary fashion, he tried to represent such spectacles as offered themselves more frequently to his gaze, or that struck him most. The chiefs for whom he worked spent the time they could spare from predatory or border affrays in hunting wild beasts, and thus fitted themselves for warfare. Hence it is that the sculptor shows a strong predilection for scenes of battle and of the chase. These and similar pictures, oft repeated, gave his hand suppleness and pliabiHty, they enabled him to attack with greater confidence the human and animal