Page:History of Art in Primitive Greece - Mycenian Art Vol 2.djvu/336

 Animal Representation. 283 which even then was venturing on works in the round boss, to cover the faijades of imposing edifices or the surface of furniture with bas-reliefs. But the shapes were largely used by the goldsmith, and especially the ceramist, who married them with designs evolved from manifold combinations of lines. We shall have more to say in regard to the latter in a future chapter. Among nationalities the most diverse, no sooner has man acquired some proficiency in his art, than he ceases to be content with copying the varied forms which he sees in the world around him. His ambition soars to greater heights; he Fio. 408,— Ivory griffin from bee-hive grave. Actual sbe. wishes to emulate Nature, and have types that shall be all his own. To invent, however, really fresh and newly-minted forms is an undertaking far beyond his power. All he can hope to distil from his imagination is that it shall unite types necessarily distinct in Nature into composite forms of a more or less attractive character, according as the sense for the plastic arts is more or less alive with the nation amongst whom they are elaborated. The first essayal made at Troy in this direction resulted in a six-legged animal (Fig. 405). This incipient stage has long been left behind in Achaean Hellas, where the con- ceptions of the mind are shadowed forth by an art which handles materials as it lists. We shall find here fictitious beings such as the griffin and sphinx among the wall-paintings and intaglios ;