Page:Smithsonian Report (1909).djvu/695

Rh served by reason of their distance from the entrance, the absolute calm, and the uniform temperature of air and walls.

One of the striking features about paleolithic art is its realism. This is especially true of the phases leading to the period of its highest development. Recent investigations confirm in the main Piette's views as to the evolution of Quaternary art, although the successive stages overlap more than he had supposed. Sculpture appeared in the lower Aurignacian, but continued without interruption through the Solutréan and to the middle of the Magdalenian—a much longer period than Piette had in mind. Although beginning but little earlier than engraving, sculpture came to full fruition first. Engraving, on the other hand, developed more slowly at first, not reaching its zenith till the middle Magdalenian, when it supplanted sculpture.

The sculptor's problem is in many respects the simpler, his opportunity of success greater. Not confined to a single aspect of his model, he has as many chances of succeeding as there are angles from which to view his work. The engraver or painter, on the other hand, must seize the likeness at the first attempt or else fail. His model was almost always an animal form, generally a quadruped. The most striking, as well as the most complete, single aspect of a quadruped is its profile. This happens to be the view that can be most easily represented on a plane surface.

In dealing, however, with the human form the problem is more complex. So far as the head is concerned, the profile presents fewer difficulties and at the same time is quite as characteristic as the front view. With the body it is just the reverse, the view from the front being the most complete and characteristic as well as the easiest to manage. This element of complexity in a given aspect of the human form must have confused the primeval engraver and painter not a little, although it was not of such a nature as to disturb the sculptor. Herein may lie the reasons why the latter chose as models man and four-footed animals indifferently, while the former's predilections for quadruped forms were so pronounced. At any rate, the fact is that a large majority of paleolithic engravings and practically all the paintings are animal profiles. The earliest ones are in absolute profile, thus simplifying the problem of representing the legs with- out materially detracting from the general effect.

By degrees more freedom entered into the execution of the figures and more or less successful attempts were made at bringing out details of anatomy by means of incised lines or color or both. The artist, however, retained his predilection for profiles. Attempts at rendering any other aspect are rare even in the Magdalenian. One of the most creditable efforts is the front view of a reindeer incised on a piece of reindeer horn (fig. 13). That the artist was ignorant,