THE ART OF CASTING IN PLASTER AMONG THE ANCIENT GREEKS AND ROMANS.

I.

The question whether the art of making moulds and casts in plaster was known to the ancient Greeks and Romans was discussed some years ago by Mr. Charles C. Perkins, in an interesting pamphlet entitled “Du Moulage en Plâtre chez les Anciens,”8 in which he collected various passages from ancient writers bearing more or less on this subject, and endeavored by their authority to establish the fact that this process was known and practiced at a comparatively early period in the history of art. After a careful examination of all his citations and arguments, as well as other authorities which he does not cite, we feel compelled to dissent entirely from his conclusions. We do not think he has made out his case. The question is an interesting one, however, from an archæological point of view at least, and well deserves consideration.

The only passage among the writings of the ancients which at first sight would seem directly to affirm that the process of casting in plaster from life, from clay models, or from statues in the round, in the modern meaning of that phrase, was known to the Greeks and Romans occurs in the “Natural History” of Pliny, and is as follows:—

“Hominis autem imaginem gypso e facie ipsa primus omnium expressit, ceraque in eam formam gypsi infusa emendare instituit Lysistratus Sicyonis, frater Lysippi, de quo diximus. Hic et similitudinem reddere instituit, ante eum quam pulcherrimum facere studebant. Idem et de signis effigiem exprimere invenit, crevitque res in tantum, ut nulla signa statuæve sine argilla fierent. Quo apparet antiquiorem hanc fuisse scientiam quam fundendi æris. Plastæ laudatissimi fuere Damophilus et Gorgasus idemque pictores qui Cereris ædem Romæ ad Circum Maximum utroque genere artis suæ excoluerunt.”9

Mr. Perkins, following in substance other translators, thus freely translates and develops this passage:—

“Lysistrate de Sicyone fut le premier à prendre en plâtre des moules de la figure humaine. Dans ces moules il coulait de la cire, puis il corrigeait ces masques de cire d’après la nature. De la sorte, il atteignit la ressemblance, tandis qu’avant lui on ne s’appliquait qu’à faire de belles têtes. Lysistrate imagina aussi de reproduire l’image des statues, procédé qui obtint une telle vogue, que depuis lors ni figure ni statue ne fut faite sans argile, et l’on soit en conclure que ce procédé est antérieur à la fonte du bronze.”

If this translation be correct, there seems to be no doubt either that Pliny was mistaken, or that the ancients knew and practiced the modern art of casting in plaster.

Is, then, this translation correct? It seems to us to be an utter misapprehension of the whole meaning of the passage. Pliny says nothing about moulding or casting, and thus to translate and amplify the words he does use is to assume the very facts in question. What he really says is literally as follows:—

“Lysistratus of Sicyon, brother of Lysippus, of whom we have spoken, first of all expressed the image of a man in gypsum from the whole person [that is, made full-length portraits], and improved it with wax [or color, for, as we shall see, cera means both] spread over the form. He first began to make likenesses, whereas before him the study was to make persons as beautiful as possible. He also invented expressing effigies from statues; and this practice so grew that no statues or signa [which were full-length figures either painted, modeled, cast in bronze, or executed in marble] were made without white clay. From which it would seem that this science [or process] was older than that of casting in bronze. The most famous modelers were Damophilus and Gorgasus, who were also painters, and who decorated the temple of Ceres at Rome with both branches of their art.”

The first sentence, thus literally rendered, it will be perceived, has in many respects the same ambiguity in English as in Latin. The words “image,” “expression,” and “form” have all a double signification, and the question is what is their true meaning in this connection.

If it can be shown that this passage neither describes nor proposes to describe the process of casting in plaster, as we understand that phrase, the keystone of the whole argument that it was known to the ancients falls out. No other writer directly asserts that such a knowledge or practice existed, and all allusions to this matter contained in any ancient author are purely collateral, and have no force in themselves. Further, some well-known facts which we shall have occasion to bring forward later are entirely opposed to the probability of such a knowledge and practice.

It is upon this passage in Pliny, then, that the whole case depends. Now, in a doubtful and obscure question like this, dependent upon the statement of any single author, we have a right to claim three things: first, that the statement should be clear and fairly susceptible of only one explanation; second, that it should not be contradicted by a subsequent statement immediately following; third, that the author himself should be trustworthy.

And in the first place, as to the author. The “Natural History” of Pliny is certainly a most interesting, amusing, and in many respects valuable book, but quite as certainly it is one of the most inaccurate that ever was written, abounding in half-knowledge, second-hand information, legendary statements, and rubbish of every kind. It is, in a word, the commonplace book of an agreeable, gossiping man, of a wide reading, who took little pains to be accurate, who reported everything he heard with slight examination, who was exceedingly credulous, and who accepted as truth and fact the most ridiculous stories. All is fish that comes to his net. In his chapters relating to artists and art he is singularly devoid of judgment or accurate knowledge; he constantly confuses things which have no relation to each other, often contradicts himself, and becomes at times utterly unintelligible. Yet we are forced to turn to Pliny, to give a weight and authority to his words upon art, and to own a deep debt of gratitude to him, not because he is trustworthy, but simply because he alone of all the ancient authors, with the exception of Pausanias, has given us a detailed account of the statues and artists of antiquity. His account of the ancient artists and their works is the fullest we have, and adrift as we often are on a wide sea of conjecture, we are glad to seize upon any straws and fragments, “rari nantes in gurgite vasto” of blankness and doubt; seizing here a bit from Pausanias, Herodotus, or Lucian, there a waif from Cicero, or a floating fragment from one of the great tragic poets, and glad enough to get upon any such raft as that which Pliny gives us, however leaky and rickety. But seaworthy or trustworthy in emergencies Pliny certainly is not.

In the next place, as to the passage under discussion. So far from its being clear and distinct, its obscurity, confusion, and apparent contradiction are so great as to have baffled every effort to explain it satisfactorily; and Dr. Brunn, one of the most accomplished of archæologists, in his history of Greek art, finding it impossible to reconcile the different sentences, does not hesitate to treat a portion as an interpolation, or at least out of place where it appears.

Two views are to be taken of the process described by Pliny: first, that by the term “cera” he means wax; and second, that he means color. Taking the first view, let us now consider the passage in question, sentence by sentence, and endeavor to unravel its real meaning. Lysistratus, first of all, made likenesses of men in gypsum from their whole figure (that is, whole-length portraits), and improved them with wax (or color) spread over the form (core or model) of gypsum. “Imaginem gypso e facie ipsa expressit” are the words of Pliny which Mr. Perkins in common with other translators supposes to mean “made moulds in plaster from the face,”—“prendre en plâtre des moules.” But this simple phrase cannot be twisted into such a meaning. “Exprimere,” according to Forcellinus, is “effingere, rappresentare, assomigliare, ritrarre dal vivo.” “Exprimere” alone would be, therefore, according to this last definition, to make a portrait from life. The additional words, “imaginem e facie ipsa,” make this meaning still stronger. “Imaginem” means a full-length figure or likeness, and not a mould, as would be required by Mr. Perkins’s translation. “Exprimere imaginem” cannot be forced to mean “made a mould,” whether in gypsum or in any other material. Suppose we translate the words literally, “to express an image in plaster,” and interpret “image” to mean mould, it is plain that the phrase is wrong; it should be impress and not express. You cannot express a mould. It is impressed on the face. In like manner when Plautus says “expressa imago in cera,” or “expressa simulacra ex auro,” he means making a portrait in color or in gold. Again, “facies” does not mean face, but the total outward shape, appearance, or figure of a man. “Vultus” is the proper term for face, and is so used by Pliny himself; as when he speaks, for instance, of the portraits of the head of Epicurus as “vultus Epicuri,” and distinguishes them from the full-length figures of athletes, “imagines athletarum,” with which the ancients adorned their palæstra and anointing-rooms. In fact, the whole chapter in which this passage occurs relates to portraits, and is entitled “honos imaginum.” If there could be any question on this point, it would be settled by a passage in Aulus Gellius (13, 29), in which he defines “facies” as the build of the whole body,—“facies est factura quædam totius corporis;” and Cicero, in his treatise “De Legibus” (1, 9), says, “That which is called ‘vultus’ exists in no living being except man,”—“Is qui appellatur vultus nullo in animante esse præter hominem potest.”10 So Virgil in “vivos ducent de marmore vultus” means the face. “Imago,” on the contrary, and “facies” mean the whole figure; only “facies” means the real figure, and “imago” the imitation of it. Pliny himself invariably uses them so, and in one of his letters (ep. 7, 33, 2) he recommends that we should be careful to select the best artist to make a full-length likeness,—“Esse nobis curæ solet ut facies nostra ab optimo quoque artifice exprimatur.” By the word “exprimatur” he certainly does not refer to casting. So mechanical an operation as this surely does not require the best of artists. “Imaginem e facie ipsa” means therefore a full-length likeness.

Again, “infundere” does not necessarily mean pour in, but is quite as often used in the sense of poured over or spread on; as where Ovid says, “infundere ceram tabellis;” or where Virgil says, “campi fusi in omnem partem,” or “sole infuso terris;” or again where Ovid uses the phrases “collo infusa mariti” or “nudos humeris infusa capillos,” it can only mean spread over. Wax cannot be poured into a flat surface like a tablet, or hair poured into shoulders.

Mr. Perkins, with Forcellinus before his eyes, after citing his definitions of “exprimere” says: “Explications qui toutes rentrent dans l’idée de représenter, de reproduire, de prendre sur le vif, comme on dit en français, et par conséquent dans l’idée du moulage.” But “ritrarre dal vivo” means nothing more than to make a portrait from life, whatever “prendre sur le vif” may mean; nor can any one of Forcellinus’s definitions be tortured into an allusion to casting. “Mais,” he continues, “cette idée surtout est accusée dans Tacite, qui dit en parlant d’un vêtement que dessinait les formes, un vêtement collant ‘vestis artus exprimens.’” But surely this phrase means simply a garment expressing, or as we should say showing, the limbs, and has nothing more to do with “casting” than “dessinait les formes” has to do with drawing, or a “vêtement collant” has to do with glue. He also thinks another phrase used by Pliny—“expressi cera vultus”—has a similar significance. If all our metaphors are to be subjected to this strict test, we must be very careful how we speak. Yet these and similar examples, which he says he could multiply, “peuvent suffire,” he thinks, “pour nous autoriser à croire que Pline a voulu dire que Lysistrate était l’inventeur de la reproduction des statues par le plâtre, en d’autres termes qu’il était le premier qui avait eu l’idée de se servir du gypse pour mouler.” This, to say the least, is going very far. With such philologic views, what would he think of this phrase, “vera paterni oris effigies,” or “vivos ducent de marmore vultus,” or “infans omnibus membris expressa”? Or, to take an English line, what would he make of—

But if Pliny meant casting, why did he not use the appropriate Latin word for that process—“fundere”? In the subsequent sentence, speaking of casting in brass, he says “fundendi æris.” “Fundere” meant to cast, not “exprimere.”

Besides, let us look at the practical difficulty in this process. After the moulds were made and the wax cast into them, as Mr. Perkins interprets Pliny to mean, we have still only wax impressions, and not plaster castings. And how were they got out of the mould after they were cast? We, in modern times, have learned no method of doing this; we should be obliged first to make the mould in plaster, then to make a cast in plaster in that mould, then on that cast to make a piece-mould with sections to take apart,—an elaborate process; and then we could get a wax cast, but not before. The fact that the cast mentioned by Pliny (supposing he means a cast) is in wax not only involves quadruple labor and skill on the part of the caster, but makes the process impossible, or next to impossible, if it were simply as he is supposed to describe it. If the cast were in plaster, it would resist, so that the mould could be broken off from it in bits; but with wax this would be entirely impracticable.

Let us still further consider the phrase “ceraque in eam formam gypsi infusa emendare instituit.” What does “cera in eam formam infusa” mean? Simply to cover or spread wax (or color) over that model; just as Ovid says “infundere ceram tabellis,” to spread wax over the tablets, not to pour wax into the tablets, for that was impossible, they being flat surfaces, nor to cast them. Again, Pliny does not say that Lysistratus introduced the practice of spreading wax over a core, or of pouring wax into a form, or casting; but only of improving the likenesses, or working them up in the wax after it was spread over the plaster: “instituit emendare,” he says, not “instituit infundere.” “Formam” here has not the signification of mould, but of model or image. Undoubtedly the term “forma” in Latin was used to signify a mould as well as a cast, or a model, or a form; and in this respect it had the same ambiguity that the corresponding terms “mould” and “form” have in English. A “form” is a seat, as well as a shape and a ceremony, and “mould” is constantly, though improperly, used to indicate a model or the thing moulded, as well as the real mould in which it is cast; the phrases “to model” and “to mould” are often synonymous in meaning. So “forma” was sometimes employed in its primary significance of figure, shape, and configuration, as when Quinctilian says, “Eadem cera aliæ atque aliæ formæ duci solent,”—various shapes may be given to the same wax; sometimes in the sense of image, as when Cicero speaks of “formæ clarissimorum,” the images of distinguished men; sometimes to mean a model or shape over which a thing is wrought, as a shoemaker’s last,—“Si scalpra et formas non sutor emat,” as Horace says; and sometimes as indicating a hollow mould in which bronze is cast, as when Pliny says, “Ex iis [silicibus] formæ fiunt, in quibus æra funduntur,”—from these pebbles moulds are made, in which brass is cast. But when he uses it in this last sense, it will be observed, Pliny employs the term “fundere,” to cast, and not “exprimere,” nor “emendare.” In the passage about Lysistratus, then, “forma” would seem to mean a model, or core, like the shoemaker’s last, on which the wax was spread for the purpose of emending or improving something. What is that something which Pliny tells us he improved by this means? What can it be except the “imaginem,” the likeness? There is no other word to which “emendare” can refer. If, then, we understand the passage as meaning that Lysistratus modeled a likeness in gypsum, and then improved it or finished it in wax which he spread over the gypsum, the statement is quite intelligible, and not a word is warped from its correct significance. If we adopt the other interpretation, however, we must understand “imaginem gypso expressit” to mean that he made a mould in gypsum, contrary to the direct force of the words; and with wax poured into that mould (making “formam” equivalent to “imaginem,” and referring to it) he emended or improved—something. What? Why, the mould,—which is absurd. Again, we cannot begin by making “imaginem” mean the cast, before the “formam” or mould is made; not only because the practical process is thus reversed, but because then we should have a cast in plaster made by pouring wax into the mould, which is even more absurd. Taking “forma” to have in this sentence any of its meanings except “mould,” we have no difficulty in understanding it; taking it as “mould,” we are forced to change the primary significance of “imaginem” and “expressit,” and are involved in very serious questions.

In addition to these considerations, it must not be forgotten that this cast of gypsum, according to Mr. Perkins’s interpretation of the sentence, was made not of the face alone (“vultus”) which is by no means an easy process, but of the whole figure (“facie”), which is a very hazardous one, and to which, with all the knowledge and experience of the present day in casting, few people would be willing to submit.

A passage of Alcimus Avitus, in his poem “De Origine Mundi” (lib. 1, 6, 75), throws a clear light on the process which seems here to be described as the invention of Lysistratus:—

Here we have the body modeled (“fingere” is to model) in gypsum, and the ductile “cera” spread over all the undulations, and the rude face finished, just as Pliny describes it.

Let us now consider the next sentence, in which he says, “Hic et similitudinem reddere instituit, ante eum quam pulcherrimum facere studebant.” This certainly has nothing to do with casting. It is very important as throwing a reflex light on the previous sentence. The whole stress of the passage is to bring out the fact that Lysistratus made portraits. He used a peculiar process, perhaps, but his specialty was that he made portraits from life (“imaginem hominis e facie ipsa”), which he worked up in wax (“emendare cera”); and not only this, but his portraits were exact likenesses (“similitudinem reddere instituit”), and not merely ideal figures like those of the artists who preceded him (“ante eum quam pulcherrimum facere studebant”).

A slight glimpse at the history of the art will clear up this matter. In the early period of sculpture, only statues of divinities were made, and up to a comparatively late time these archaic figures were copied for religious and superstitious reasons, and the old formal hieratic type was strictly observed. It was not until the 58th Olympiad that iconic statues began to be made in honor of the victors in the national games, and these for the greater part were rather portraits of the peculiarities of general physical developments than of the face. Portrait statues of distinguished men now began to be made, but they were very few in number, and only exceptionally allowed by the state. The first iconic statues, representing Harmodius and Aristogeiton, were made in 509 B. C. by Antenor. Phidias followed (480 to 432 B. C.), and during his period the grand style was in its culmination, and for the most part divinities or demigods only were thought worthy subjects for a great sculptor. Iconic statues were, however, executed during this period, and among the legendary heroes and divinities who formed the subjects of the thirteen statues erected at Delphi and executed by Phidias out of the Persian spoils, the portrait of Miltiades was allowed,11 but the erection of public portrait statues was very rarely permitted, and the introduction by Phidias of his own portrait and that of Pericles among the combatants wrought upon the shield of his ivory and gold statue of Athena occasioned a prosecution against him for impiety. It is said that Phidias, in his statue of a youth binding his hair with a fillet, made the portrait of Pantarces, an Elean who was enamored of the great sculptor, and who obtained the victory at the Olympian games in the 86th Olympiad (B. C. 435). But this story, which is given by Pausanias, rests, even by his own account, purely on tradition, and was apparently founded upon a supposed resemblance between Pantarces and the statue. Portraiture in its true sense, however, now began, and soon after the death of Phidias, about the 90th Olympiad, Demetrius obtained celebrity as a portrait sculptor. He seems to have been the first to introduce the realistic school of portraiture, copying so carefully from life, particularly in his likenesses of old persons, that he was reproved for being too faithful to Nature. Quinctilian accuses him of being “nimius in veritate” (xii. 10); Lucian in his “Philopseudes” calls him an ἀνθρωποποιός, and, describing a statue by him of Pelichus the Corinthian, says it was αὐτῷ ἀνθρώπῳ ὁμοῖον,—like the very man himself. Callimachus, also, at the same period obtained the nickname of Κατατηξίτεχνος, on account of the extreme detail and finish of his works. These artists flourished nearly a century before Lysistratus; and Pliny therefore is incorrect in his sweeping statement that before the time of Lysistratus sculptors had only endeavored to make their statues as beautiful as possible, and not to give accurate portraits. Still, these men must be considered as exceptions to the general practice, and it was not until the time of Alexander that portrait-sculpture in the sense of accurate likeness was developed. Up to that period it still was heroic, generalized, and ideal in its character, with comparatively little individuality or detail. The portrait statues, for instance, of the Royal Family by Leochares (372 B. C.), and that of Mausolus (about 350 B. C.) on the famous Mausoleum erected by Artemisia, were treated in this style. Lysippus, however, during the reign of Alexander of Macedon, by his great talent gave a new impulse and development to the school of portraiture, and while retaining the heroic character he gave a more realistic truth to his works. Pliny speaks of him as distinguished for the finish of his work in the remotest details,—“argutiæ operum custoditæ in minimis rebus.” In his portraits of Alexander he represented even the defects of his royal patron, such as the stoop of his head sideways. Such was his skill that Alexander declared “that none but Apelles should represent him in color, and none but Lysippus in marble.” Lysistratus was the brother of Lysippus, and Pliny says that he introduced the practice of making portraits which were not merely heroic and ideal likenesses, but faithful representations of the real men. In attributing to Lysistratus the introduction of this practice of individual portraiture, Pliny undoubtedly goes beyond the real facts. He did not introduce the practice, he merely developed it by a peculiar process, giving additional verisimilitude thereby. This process was roughly modeling the likeness in plaster, and then finishing the surface and the details in the “cera” with which he covered it.

In painting, the sphere of portraiture was larger than in sculpture, and subject apparently to no such restrictions. The earliest portrait on record by any great painter was not of hero, philosopher, or athlete, but of Elpinice, the daughter of Miltiades and the mistress of Polygnotus, who painted her portrait as Laodice, one of the daughters of Priam, in his famous picture representing the “Rape of Cassandra,” in the Pœcile at Athens. This picture was executed about 463 B. C., when Elpinice must have been at least thirty-five years of age. Dionysius of Colophon was also a distinguished portrait-painter and celebrated for his excessive finish. Nicephorus Chumnus, the grammarian, describes Apelles and Lysippus as making and painting Ζῶσας εἰκώνας καὶ πνοῆς μόνης καὶ κινήσεως ἀπολειπόμενας,—being likenesses only wanting breath and motion. For one of his portraits of Alexander Apelles received twenty talents of gold (£5,000), which was measured, not counted, out to him. He also painted the portraits of Campaspe and Phryne in the character of Venus, taking the face from Campaspe and the nude figure from Phryne. Speaking of Apelles, Pliny himself relates in his thirty-sixth book that “he painted portraits so exact to the life that one of those persons called Metoscopi, who divine events from the features of men, was enabled, on examining his portraits, to foretell the hour of the death of the person represented.” And this monstrous story Pliny apparently accepts. At all events, he does not question it. Parrhasius, “the most insolent and arrogant of artists,” says Pliny, “painted a portrait of himself and dedicated it in a public temple to Mercury; and though the Athenians had publicly proceeded against Phidias for so doing, they allowed it to Parrhasius, thus plainly showing that the dignity of sculpture was higher than that of painting.”

But to return from this digression to the consideration of the passage by Pliny relating to portraiture in modeling and sculpture. In the sentence immediately following, Pliny goes on to say, “Idem et de signis effigiem exprimere invenit, crevitque res in tantum, ut nulla signa statuæve sine argilla fierent,”—Lysistratus also made copies from statues, and this practice came so into vogue that no statues in brass or marble were made without white clay. What the meaning of this sentence is we can only guess; as it stands, it is quite unintelligible. Perhaps he intended to say that Lysistratus set the fashion of making small copies in clay or terra cotta of all the statues that were executed. But it is quite possible that he meant nothing of the kind. It is plain that if Lysistratus had already invented casting in plaster, it would have been unnecessary to copy statues in clay, except for the purpose of reduction to statuettes. Mr. Perkins thinks he may have intended to speak of “esquisses d’argile [maquettes] dont se servent les sculpteurs comme point de départ, esquisse reproduite plus tard en marbre et avec la mise aux points.” But there was nothing new in this; and surely Lysistratus could not be said to have invented, or set the fashion of, a process which certainly had been employed very long before his time. And again, why make a small statue in clay and enlarge it proportionally in marble, if you can make it at once in full size and cast it? Nor does Mr. Perkins seem to be aware that in adopting this view, and translating as he does “de signis effigiem exprimere,”—to make a small model or maquette in clay,—he abandons his explanation of the sentence referring to gypsum. For if “effigiem argilla exprimere” means, as he says, to make a model in clay, why does not “imaginem gypso exprimere” mean to make a model in plaster? Besides, the fact that Pliny applies the same terms to a process in clay as to one in plaster at once puts an end to the matter so far as the question of casting goes. Clay is not a material to cast with, in any proper sense of that term.

Another objection to this interpretation that Pliny meant a maquette, “esquisse,” or sketch is that “effigies” did not mean sketch. It carried with it nearly the significance of our own word effigy,—of great reality of imitation. “Imago” was a vaguer word, and might indicate a delusive resemblance as by painting; but “effigiem” was ordinarily employed to designate a more absolute imitation. Thus Cicero says, “Nos vere juris germanæ justitiæ que solidam et expressam effigiem nullam tenemus. Umbra et imaginibus utimur.”12 And again, “Consectatur nullam eminentem effigiem virtutis sed adumbratam imaginem gloriæ.” “Effigies” would, therefore, carry no such idea as that of sketch.

Besides, not only is “effigies” not the correct word for sketch, but Pliny would scarcely have used it in this sense, when immediately afterwards, speaking of the sketches of Arcesilaus, which sold for more than the finished works of other artists, he employs the appropriate term for sketches,—“proplasma.” In the translation of Pliny, published by Mr. Bohn, and made by Mr. Bostick and Mr. Riley, this term is translated “models in plaster;” but it simply means sketches or antijicta, in whatever material they were made. The words “plastæ” and “plasma” have nothing to do with plaster. “Plastæ” were simply modelers, and πλαστική was the art of modeling,—the plastic art.

Again, Pliny could scarcely have intended to say that Lysistratus invented modeling sketches of statues in clay before executing them in plaster, since he tells us explicitly that Pasiteles used to say that plastice was the mother of statuaria, scalptura, et cælatura; and, though he was distinguished as first in all these arts, he never executed anything in them until he had first modeled it in clay,—“nihil unquam fecit, antequam finxit.”

Before leaving this sentence, let us take a different view of its possible meaning. May not Pliny use the words “signa” and “signis” to mean pictures and not statues? Undoubtedly “signum” was thus used, as where Plautus speaks of a “signum pictum in parieti,”—a picture painted on the wall; or where Virgil speaks of a “pallam signis auroque rigentem,”—a mantle stiff with embroidered figures and gold. In this sense the passage would mean that Lysistratus made effigies from pictures as well as from statues, and that thenceforward not only no statues but no pictures were made without being copied in bas-relief, or in the round, argilla, or white clay. This would account for the use of the word “effigiem,” which has a stronger significance of reality than “imaginem.”

The succeeding sentence is even more obscure; and, unless it be interpolated or out of its proper place, is quite unintelligible. In the connection in which it now stands it is absurd. It is as follows: “Quo apparet antiquiorem hanc fuisse scientiam quam fundendi æris,”—by which it seems that this knowledge or practice was older than that of casting in bronze. What is the “scientiam” to which he refers? He has previously spoken only of two: first, that of making portraits in plaster and wax; second, that of making copies of statues in clay,—both, as he says, invented or introduced into practice by Lysistratus. But to say that that artist could have invented any process older than that of casting in bronze is not only ridiculous in itself, but inconsistent with what he has previously told us; since at least two centuries previous to the time of Lysistratus, Rhœcus and Theodorus of Samos—as we learn from Pausanias, Herodotus, and even Pliny himself—exercised the art of casting in bronze. Pausanias,13 indeed, tells us that these sculptors invented this art; but Pliny, with his usual inaccuracy and carelessness, says that they invented “plastice,” or the art of modeling (“In Samo primos omnium plasticen invenisse Rhœcum et Theodorum,” ch. xxxv.),—an art which from the very nature of things must have been practiced from the earliest and rudest ages, almost from the time when the first child made the first mud-pie.

Dr. Brunn,14 in commenting on this passage in Pliny, accepts the first sentence as describing the art of casting in plaster, but, finding it impossible to reconcile it with the subsequent sentences, ingeniously suggests that it was an addition inserted in the margin, and afterwards interpolated into the text by the copyists in the wrong place. Throwing out this first sentence about Lysistratus from this place, he still accepts it, and interprets it to mean that Lysistratus invented the art of casting. The subsequent sentences he connects with a previous passage in Pliny, in which he gives an account of Dibutades of Sicyon, a potter by trade, and relates the legend that this artist drew the outline of the face of a girl whom he loved from her shadow on the wall, and his father pressed clay upon it within those outlines, and made a typum which he baked. The passage, according to Dr. Brunn, then would continue: “He [Dibutades] also invented the making of effigies from signa, and this practice so increased that thenceforward no statues or signa were made without argilla; so that it appears that this art was more ancient than that of casting in bronze.” By accepting this suggestion of Dr. Brunn we certainly relieve Pliny of the absurdity of stating that any “scientiam” or practice invented by Lysistratus was older than casting in bronze, since centuries before his time bronze figures of colossal proportions had been cast. But even supposing these sentences to refer to Dibutades and not to Lysistratus, they are far from being clear or accurate. Is it possible to believe that, while the making of brick and earthenware utensils and fictile vases is so ancient that the memory of man runneth not to the contrary, no one before Dibutades had ever attempted to model a figure or a face in clay, or to put a model into a furnace and bake it? All history is against such a supposition. Images in terra cotta were made by the ancient Egyptians, Babylonians, and Ephesians centuries before Dibutades. The ancient Etruscan terra cottas previous to his epoch were scattered, as Pliny himself says, all over the world: “Signa Tuscanica per terras dispersa.” The capitol was decorated with earthen statues at the time of the first Tarquin, and Pausanias mentions many clay statues of gods and demigods executed in the earliest ages of Greece itself.

Again, from this very passage it is clear that Pliny himself admits that there were signa and statuæ already existing at the time of Dibutades, of which he first made effigies. What did Dibutades invent? Certainly not the art of modeling in clay, or of baking the clay. His statement, also, that thenceforward no statues were made without clay is scarcely intelligible, unless we suppose him to mean that clay models were made thenceforward before executing statues in stone or other materials. But he does not say this. Again, he cannot mean that Dibutades first invented taking impressions from indented outlines, or intaglii, for this was as old as the first primitive seal, and was no more invented by Dibutades than by Lysistratus.

Dr. Brunn interprets the statement in respect to Dibutades as showing that he was probably the first inventor of casting, at the same time that he also interprets the sentences referring to Lysistratus as declaring that he first invented casting,—the only difference being that the process of the one was in clay, and that of the other in plaster.

But is it clear that Dibutades, according to Pliny, ever made even a stamp in clay from indented outlines on the wall? The passage is ordinarily so interpreted, but is this interpretation correct? Pliny says that Dibutades having traced the shadow on the wall in outline, his father impressed clay within that outline, and thus made a typum which he baked with other articles of earth, and which was long afterwards preserved in the Nymphæum at Corinth. His words are, “quibus lineis pater ejus impressa argilla typum fecit.” What, then, is the meaning of “typum”? Evidently not a mould, or impression, but a relief. Had it been a mould, he could have stamped from it a hundred impressions, since it would have been merely a seal with an irregularly relieved outline; and in order to have the repetition of what was on the wall he must perforce have stamped from it an impression. This he evidently did not do, or at least nothing is said to indicate anything of the kind. He preserved and baked what he first obtained, which, if it was merely a mould, would have produced, to say the least, no effect. The true as well as the literal translation of this passage would seem to be, “within the outlines by putting on clay he made a relief.” This clay he probably modeled as well as he could, keeping within the lines, and then removed it from the wall and baked it. The same interpretation of this passage is given by Giovanni Battista Adriani, in a remarkable essay or rather letter addressed by him to Giorgio Vasari in 1567, in which he gives a summary of the most celebrated Greek artists and their works. “Typus” in Latin had the double significance of “intaglio” and “relievo,” as our word “type” has of the type itself and the printed impression; and sometimes it was used in one sense and sometimes in the other, but it was usually employed to mean a relief. Thus Cicero, in one of his letters to Atticus (lib. i. ep. 10), writes, “Præterea typos tibi mando quos in tectorio atrioli possim includere,”—I commission you also to procure me some reliefs to be inserted in the plaster of the anteroom. And Pliny in this passage would plainly seem to use the word in the same sense; otherwise he would probably have written “forma,” as he did in other cases when he meant a mould. Not that even that word would be free from all ambiguity, but it would more appropriately signify a mould.

But however ingenious is the suggestion of Dr. Brunn that the passages relating to Lysistratus ought to belong to Dibutades, the fact is that in all editions of Pliny they are connected with Lysistratus; and as this suggestion does not dispose of all difficulties and clear up the matter, we will proceed to consider them in that relation, and see if anything can be made clearly out of them.

Plainly, if the “scientiam” here spoken of refers to the invention of Lysistratus, and is interpreted to be the art of casting in plaster, it is ridiculously incorrect to say that it was older than casting in brass. If that invention be of modeling in plaster, it is also entirely incorrect. We know that this was practiced at least a century previous,—as, for instance, in the construction of the great statue of Zeus at Megara, the body of which was of plaster and clay, the head alone being cased in gold and ivory; and also of the Bacchus in painted plaster, of which Pausanias speaks.

The only way in which we can explain the statement that any “scientiam” or process described by Pliny as used by Lysistratus was older than the art of casting in bronze, is by supposing he meant to say that the process he employed was in itself an old one, and that it was only in the practical application to the making of portraits that there was any novelty,—the process of covering a core of plaster with wax being older than casting in bronze, while covering a sketch of plaster with wax and then working that surface up from life was new. The statement so understood would be intelligible at least, and, as far as we know, perfectly correct. The method of the ancients in casting bronze statues is not described by any ancient writer, but it is supposed to have been this: A fire-proof core was first built up of plaster, clay, earth, or other materials, and over this a thin and even coating of wax or pitch was spread; or perhaps, which is not so probable, the surface was rasped down to the thickness intended for the bronze, and afterwards covered with a thin coating of wax. In either case the result would be the same. The outside of this wax being then completely covered with sand or packed clay-dust, there would be a thin coating of wax inclosed between the two surfaces, which, melting away before the fused metal, would allow that metal to take its place. This would account for the remarkable thinness and evenness of the ancient bronzes; for by such a method the core would be perfect, and the artist would naturally put on as little wax as possible. If we suppose the statue, after it was nearly completed in plaster or clay, not to have been rasped down but simply to have been covered with wax, we shall see that the result would be that the bronze cast would be a little fuller in size and thicker in proportions than the original model. And this is a peculiar characteristic of the ancient bronzes, especially to be observed in the limbs and joints, which are generally larger and puffier in bronze than in marble statues.

Now if Pliny meant to say of Lysistratus that his method of modeling portraits by making a plaster figure or core, and covering the surface with wax, was older than that of casting in bronze, he was quite right; for undoubtedly the process of covering a core with wax must have preceded that of casting in bronze, or at least must have been coincident with it. But at the same time this method had previously been used only, or at least chiefly, in casting; whereas Lysistratus was the first to use it for modeling from life and carefully finishing every part. The process was old; the application was new.

Thus far in considering this passage we have proceeded on the hypothesis that the “cera” spoken of was wax. But another and quite different view is also possible, and seems in all probability to be the correct one. Pliny may mean to refer to quite a different thing, and by the term “cera” may have meant not wax but color. “Ceræ” was the common term for a painter’s colors, and Pliny himself thus uses it in defining encaustic painting: “Ceris pingere et picturam inurere.” Varro also says, “Pictores locutulas magnas habent arculas ubi discolores sunt ceræ.” Statius also uses the same term when he says, “Apelleæ cuperent te scribere ceræ.” Anacreon, in his odes, constantly uses κηρός for picture; as, for instance,—

Here it is not a waxen figure, but a wax, or oil,—that is, a painting of Eros, not an ἀγάλμα. And in the same ode the youth replies in Doric, “Οὐκ εἰμὶ κηροτέχνης”—“I am not a painter;” or even more manifestly in the ode beginning,—

And again,—

Wax was the common medium used by painters. After it had been purified and blanched, their colors were mixed with it just as ours are with oil; and in like manner, as we speak of painting in oils, they spoke of painting in wax. A head done in chalk would no more necessarily mean a head modeled in chalk or plaster, than “imaginem [or effigiem] cera expressam” would mean a likeness modeled in wax.

The substances on which the ancients painted were wood, clay, plaster, stone, parchment, and perhaps canvas. The best painters, however, rarely painted on anything but tablets or panels. “Nulla gloria artificum est nisi eorum qui tabulas pinxere,” says Pliny (xxxv. 37). These panels were of wood; they were prepared for painting by spreading over them chalk or white plaster (gypsum), and on that account were called “λεύκωμα.” All the paintings on walls were also on plaster covered with a composition of chalk and marble dust, as is fully described by Vitruvius.15

Let us now apply these facts to Pliny’s statement. May he not intend to say, and is not this a legitimate meaning of his words, that Lysistratus first of all modeled portraits in gypsum from life, and then increased the likeness by color laid on to the plaster bust. He also made colored copies or effigies from brass statues (which were called, as we know, “ceræ”), and these came so into vogue that thenceforward there were no statues without white clay or chalk, which, as we have seen, was a preparation for the wax color as shown by Vitruvius. In this view of his meaning, the statement that this peculiar process is older than that of casting in bronze becomes intelligible, if we suppose him to intend to say that coloring statues was a very old process, while coloring portraits in exact imitation of life was the invention of Lysistratus. The succeeding sentence then becomes clear, in which he says that the most famous plastæ were Damophilus and Gorgasus, who were also painters, and who decorated the Temple of Ceres at Rome in both these arts, since it is plain that these works were both modeled and painted.

The making of portraits in effigy, colored in imitation of life, had been a common practice in Rome, as we learn from Pliny himself, and these, because they were colored, were technically called “ceræ” as well as “imagines.” It was the custom of the great families to set up these colored figures in their atria, and on particular festivals to carry them in procession through the streets of Rome, draped with actual robes such as were worn by the persons whom they represented. Pliny expresses his regret that in his time this custom had fallen into disuse, tending as it did to keep fresh and alive the personal memory of great men who had passed away from this life.16

It will be useful here to consider the character of the whole chapter in which this passage appears. It is entitled, “Plastices primi inventores, de simulacris, et vasis fictilibus et pretio eorum.” The object of the chapter is to give an account of modeling and modelers, not of casting. In a previous chapter, where Pliny is speaking of some early products of the plastic art, and particularly of the signa Tuscanica, or earthenware statues, he says: “It appears to me a singular fact, that, though the origin of statues was of such great antiquity in Italy, the images of the gods, which were consecrated to them in their temples, should have been fashioned of wood or earthenware, until the conquest of Asia introduced luxury among us. It will be most convenient to speak of the art of making likenesses [similitudines exprimendi] when we come to speak of what the Greeks call ‘plastice,’ for the art of modeling was prior to that of statuary of bronze and marble,—[prior quam statuaria fuit]. But this last art has flourished in such an infinite degree that to pursue the subject thoroughly would require many volumes.” Thus he announces clearly beforehand what he intends to speak of in this chapter which we are now considering, on plasticæ. It is the art of “making likenesses, of the first invention of modeling, of fictile vases, and of their price,” but not of casting or of any such invention. The previous chapter, in which this announcement is made of his subsequent intention, is devoted to casting in bronze and brass-work, or statuaria. After making this statement, he goes on to enumerate the principal works in bronze, and then says that portrait statues were long afterwards placed in the Forum and in the atria of private houses; that clients thus did honor to their patrons, and that in former times the statues thus dedicated were dressed in togas: “Togatæ effigies antiquitus ita dicabantur;” or ought not “dicabantur” to be dicebantur,—meaning that these statues were called “togatæ effigies”?

In the chapter we are now considering, he begins by saying that, having already said enough about pictures, he now proposes to append some account of the plastic art. Then he speaks of Dibutades, and relates the story of his making the portrait of the girl he loved; and adds that he first invented a method of coloring his works in pottery by adding red earth or red chalk. Then follows the passage about Lysistratus, who used plaster instead of clay to make portraits, covering it with wax or color to improve the resemblance. After the passages cited, he goes on to mention other celebrated modelers (plastæ laudatissimi), among whom were Damophilus and Gorgasus, who were also painters, and who adorned the Temple of Ceres at Rome by the exercise of both their arts. According to Varro, he says, everything in the temples was Tuscanica,—that is, ancient pottery of the Etruscan school; and when they were repaired the painted coatings of the walls were removed and framed. He also mentions Chalcosthenes, who executed several works in baked earth. He cites Varro again as saying that Possis at Rome executed grapes, fruit, and fishes with such truth to Nature that they could not be distinguished from the real things. Dibutades, he also says, invented a method of coloring plastic composition by adding red earth.

Throughout the chapter Pliny is not speaking solely of modelers, but most of those he mentions colored their works. The grapes, fruit, and fishes of Possis, the works of Damophilus and Gorgasus, the Tuscanica in the temples, all were colored in imitation of the objects represented. And besides these he mentions particularly the Jupiter of Pasiteles, made in clay, “et ideo miniari solitum,”—and therefore proper for painting in vermilion. He also speaks of “figlina opera,”—earthenware painted in encaustic,—which were on the baths of Agrippa in Rome. All this seems to lend probability to the interpretation of “cera” to mean color and not wax; at all events, there is not a word about casting, unless the words relating to Lysistratus can be tortured into such a meaning. What adds still more to the probability that this was the real thought of Pliny in the passage cited is the use of the words “effigies” and “argilla.” “Effigies” in Latin is distinguished from “simulacrum” (which may be a picture as well as a statue), both being representations indicating something which shows they are not life itself, the one being flat and the other colorless; while “effigies” carries the idea of deception with it, so far as resemblance goes. Thus Cicero says, “Vidistis non fratrem tuum nec vestigium quidem aut simulacrum, sed effigiem quamdam spirantis mortui.” So, also, “argilla” means white clay, and not ordinary clay out of which terra cotta images were made; and Pliny may have intended by these words to express the idea that after Lysistratus had made effigies or colored copies of brass or marble statues, white clay was constantly used, for the reason that it was manifestly better for coloring. This would relieve him from the absurdity of saying that Lysistratus invented or led the way in modeling in clay, rather than in the use of white clay which he colored. Argilla and gypsum would then be nearly the same thing, both used as a basis for colored walls, upon which “cera” or color was laid or infused. This would clear up the subsequent statement that this art was older than casting in bronze, since it is plain that coloring statues was very ancient. Pausanias mentions two,—one of the Ephesian Diana and one of Bacchus in wood, gilt except the faces,—which were painted with vermilion. So, in the Wisdom of Solomon (ch. xiii. and xv.), images of wood and clay are spoken of, painted in red and vermilion and stained with divers colors; and in 630 B. C. there were images in gold, silver, stone, and wood in Babylon (Baruch, ch. vi. and xiii.), painted and gilded and dressed, and colored purple.

In his chapter entitled “Honos Imaginum,”—the honor attached to portraits,—Pliny says it was the custom of the Romans to adorn their palæstra and anointing-rooms with the portraits of athletes (“imaginibus athletarum”), and to carry about on their persons the face of Epicurus (“vultus Epicuri”); and that they also prized the portraits of strangers (“alienasque effigies colunt”). Afterwards, contrasting the habits of the Romans of his own day with those of the ancient Romans, he says: “And since the former have no longer in them any likeness to the minds of their ancestors, they also neglect the likeness of their bodies. How different it was,” he continues, “with our ancestors, who placed in their atria to be gazed at these ‘imagines,’ and not statues by foreign artists in brass or marble, and kept colored portraits of their faces each in its separate case, to serve as ‘imagines’ to accompany their funerals.”17 It would seem from this that, besides the draped images or effigies in the halls, modeled and colored busts of others of the family, probably of less distinction, were also kept to be dressed up on occasion, made into effigies, and carried in procession. Other “imagines” of the most distinguished personages in the family were placed outside at the threshold of the house, hung with the spoils of the enemy.

It is of these “expressi cera vultus” and these “imagines” kept by the Romans as proofs of their nobility, and on which their pedigrees were inscribed, that Ovid speaks when he says,—

On the sale of the house they were not allowed to be destroyed or removed, but passed with it, and were bought by “novi homines” (men of no family), and passed off by them as the portraits of their own ancestors,—just as the portraits of Wardour Street are at the present day. Cicero in his invective against Piso cries out, “Obrepsisti ad honores errore hominum, commendatione fumosarum imaginum, quarum simile habes nihil præter colorem;” and Sallust in his Jugurtha says, “Quia imagines non habeo, et quia mihi nova nobilitas est.”

Nor were the Romans singular in this custom of draping figures with real stuffs. The images of the gods in early Greece also were draped and dressed in clothes, and crowns were placed on their heads. They had false hair, too, which was dressed regularly by attendants, and at stated times they were washed and adorned with jewels and had their dresses arranged, just as if they were alive. In later times this custom died out; but the colossal Athena’s solid drapery of gold was washed at a certain festival appointed for the purpose, called Plyntheria. In Rome, however, the custom was maintained to a late day. The images of the temples were adorned with real drapery, and purple mantles were hung on the statues of the emperors. The Greeks did not thus treat their portrait statues, and in this the Romans were peculiar.

The Roman “imagines” and “ceræ” were probably executed in plaster or some such material, certainly not in marble, or otherwise they would have been too heavy to be carried about in procession. Apparently they resembled the figures which Lysistratus first began to make, and the process of coloring them, if we understand “cera” to mean color, was little else than the old practice, called “circumlitio,” of covering marble statues with an encaustic varnish of color so as to give them a delicate and tinted surface. The most salient example of this is to be found in the anecdote told of Praxiteles, who, when he was asked which of his statues he most admired, answered, “Those that Nicias has colored,”—“quibus Nicias manum admovisset,”—Nicias, who in his youth was celebrated as a painter of statues, ἀγαλμάτων ἐγκαυστής, having assisted him, “in statuis circumliendis.” A similar process, called καύσις, was also employed in finishing walls, and is thus described by Vitruvius: After the wall had received its color, it was covered with Punic wax and oil, which was laid on evenly with a hard brush, and then half melted or infused into a smooth surface by moving a “cauterium,” or pan of hot coals, close over it; and after that it was rubbed with a candle and a clean linen cloth.

This process, then, was old as applied to marble statues and to plaster walls. What was new in the work of Lysistratus was that he united the two methods, by modeling in plaster the general likeness and then finishing the surface in encaustic. It was an old process with a new application.

To explain such a process, what could be clearer than the words Pliny uses? We do not need to warp a word from its ordinary significance. Lysistratus made portraits in plaster from life, and improved them by color laid on to the model. He thus made realistic, exact resemblances, whereas before him artists had sought only to make heads as beautiful as possible.

What, then, were the “effigies de signis” that he made? We have already seen that the term “effigies” had a significance of reality and absolute imitation, and corresponded in great measure to the English word effigy, meaning colored effigies with real dresses,—like those of Madame Tussaud, for instance. The “imagines” and “ceræ” of the ancient Romans were very much like them; and does not Pliny mean to say that Lysistratus copied marble or brass statues, or pictures, and made these effigies from them, coloring them so as to add to the likeness, and clothing them with real draperies? and that this so grew into vogue that thenceforward there were no statues which were not thus copied in plaster or “argilla”?—using the term “argilla,” or white clay, as equivalent to gypsum, with which possibly the plaster was mixed. As “argilla” was the foundation with which the ancient panels were prepared for painting, this would seem most appropriate in such case.

Such would be the figures alluded to by Lucian, or by Lexiphanes when he says, “If you cull the flower of all these various beauties, you will in your eloquence be like those makers of figures in wax and clay [or argilla] in the Forum, colored outside with minium and blue, and inside only fragile clay.”

According to this interpretation of the passage in Pliny, it not only becomes intelligible as a whole, but is consistent and without contradiction; whereas, if we suppose that he meant to indicate the process of casting in plaster, his statements are not only entirely obscure and inconsecutive, but ignorant and contradictory.

II.

In the previous chapter we have critically considered the text of Pliny bearing upon the question whether the ancient Greeks and Romans were acquainted with the art of casting. Let us now proceed to some general considerations as to the probability that this art was known and practiced by them.

In the first place, the distinction between modeling and casting must be constantly kept in mind, and care must be taken not to confound the two totally different terms “mould” and “model.” That gypsum was used in modeling there can be no doubt, and it is quite possible that it may have been used to fill prepared moulds of stone, terra cotta, or other materials for the making of ectypa. There is indeed no proof of this; but as we know that moulds were made and cut in stone, into which clay was pressed, to be then withdrawn and baked for ectypa with which to adorn houses, so also it is possible that gypsum may have been used for this purpose. This, however, is merely a supposition, and the fact that none of them have ever been found in plaster renders it highly improbable. In these ectypa of clay, as well as in the impressions taken from them, there are no indications of anything like what we call a piece-mould, composed of many sections; and whenever there are under-cuttings in the ectypa, which could not be withdrawn from the mould and which would fasten them into it, these parts of the ectypa are invariably worked by hand. For instance, in the collection of Mr. Fol in Rome there are several terra cotta figures of low relief evidently stamped from a mould, which are appliqué, or fastened subsequently to the cista of which they form a part. The sutures under each figure are still visible, but they are all corrected and worked by hand after being withdrawn, and have evidently suffered in being removed from the mould. In the same collection there are several specimens of plaster reliefs, with such deep under-cuttings that they could not have been withdrawn from a single piece-mould; but all these under-cuttings are freely worked by hand, showing plainly that they were not in the stamp or mould; and it is also clear that they were afterwards worked over with fluid plaster, the edges and flats of which have not been rounded, but left as it was freely laid on by hand. It is probable that in these cases plaster was pressed into a mould in the same manner as clay, and afterwards worked up and finished. But the slightest examination will show clearly that if a mould was employed to give a general form to them, it certainly was not a piece-mould; and that they are not castings in the modern sense of the word, but only rude stamps.

These are the only specimens, however, so far as we are aware, of any such use of plaster for low-relief ornaments,—the ectypa which have been preserved to us being invariably of baked clay. If plaster had been used for this purpose, we should expect to find casts in the interior of houses or tombs, where they would be protected from the weather, and where they could be easily introduced into the walls and ceilings. But though elaborately ornamented designs in relief, worked in gypsum, are to be found still fresh and uninjured on the ancient tombs and baths, all of them were freely and rapidly modeled by hand while the gypsum was still fresh and plastic, and not a single specimen of cast plaster has been found. It is but a few years since the tombs in the Via Latina were opened, and in two of them the ceilings, divided into compartments, were covered with rich and fantastic designs of flowers, fruit, arabesques, groups of imaginary animals, sea-nymphs, and human figures; the designs varying in each compartment, and all modeled in the plaster with remarkable vivacity and spirit: not one of them was cast. So in the houses at Pompeii, not a vestige of a figure or ornament cast in plaster has ever been found,—nor a mould in plaster; and when one considers that, being completely protected, they would naturally have survived as well as other far more fragile and destructible objects which have been preserved, the evidence is almost absolute that they never could have existed there. If so, it is in the highest degree probable that they existed nowhere. It would seem plain, then, that even the first, simplest, and most natural processes of casting in gypsum were unknown to the ancients, for no other process is so easy and simple as to fill a flat mould with plaster and then remove it, provided there are no under-cuttings. In doing this, however, there is a slight practical difficulty if the mould is in one piece, as the least under-cutting would render it impossible to remove the cast without injury or breakage. Indeed, though there were no under-cutting, it would at least be very difficult to remove the plaster from a mould in one piece. Clay would be removed with far greater ease because of its pliancy, and any cracks or imperfections could be at once remedied; add to this that baked clay is one of the most enduring of materials, and we have the probable reasons why the ancients used it instead of gypsum. But whatever may have been their reasons, it is perfectly clear that they did use clay; and we have no evidence that they ever used plaster.

This use of gypsum to take impressions from flat moulds is suggested by Theophrastus, it would seem, in his treatise on mineralogy,18 in which he says that plaster “seems better than other materials to receive impressions.” The term ἀπόμαγμα means nothing more than an impression, such as one makes in wax from a seal ring, and such as is common still in plaster; it is to this use that he seems to refer. He does not say, however, that gypsum was really put to this use; and if it were, it would advance us little in our inquiry, since any material which is soft will receive an impression, whether it be bread, pitch, clay, wax, or any similar substance.

But the step from this simple process of stamping in a shallow mould to casting from life or from the round is enormous. The difficulties are multiplied a hundred-fold. It is no longer a simple operation, but a nice and complicated one. The part to be cast must first be oiled or soaped, then covered with plaster of about the consistency of rich cream, then divided into sections while the material is still tender, so as to enable the mould to be withdrawn part by part without breakage, then allowed to set, then removed, oiled or soaped on the interior surface, the parts all properly replaced, fluid plaster poured into the mould,—and finally, after the cast is set, the mould must be carefully removed by a hammer and chisel. This is an elaborate process as applied to an arm or a hand, but when applied to a living face it is not only difficult but disagreeable, and unless due care be used it may be dangerous; and after all a cast from the face is hard, forced, and unnatural in its character and impression, however skillfully it may be done, and can only serve the sculptor as the basis of his work. Yet if the common interpretation of the passage in Pliny be accurate, this is the process which was invented and practiced by Lysistratus, and by means of which he made portraits. Credat Judæus! With all our knowledge and practice, we do not find this to answer in our own time.

But to cast from a statue in clay is still more difficult and complicated; there the extremest care and nicety are required in making the proper divisions, in extracting the clay and irons, recommitting the sections, and breaking off the outer shell of the mould. In fact, the modern process is so complicated that no one can see it without wondering how it ever came to be so thought out and perfected, or without being convinced that it must have been slowly arrived at by many steps and many failures.

That statues were modeled in plaster by the ancients there is no doubt. Pausanias mentions several;19 and Spartianus20 also speaks of “Three Victories” in plaster, with palms in their hands, erected at one of the games,—and says that on one of the days of the Circensian games when according to common custom they were erected, the central one on which the name of Severus was inscribed, and which bore a globe, was thrown down by a gust of wind from the podium, and that another bearing the name of Geta on it also fell and was shattered to pieces.

Firmicus21 also relates that after Zagreus, son of Jupiter, was slain by the Titans, his body was cut to pieces and thrown into a cauldron, from which Minerva rescued the heart and carried it to Jupiter. He then gave it to Semele, who resuscitated Zagreus, and Jupiter afterwards preserved his likeness in plaster,—“Ex gypso plastico opere perfecit.”

Mr. Perkins cites all these instances, and says: “They authorize us to believe that the Greeks and Romans practiced casting in plaster.” But in saying this he altogether overlooks the very plain distinction between the two entirely different operations of casting and modeling. We know that they modeled in plaster; the only question is whether they cast in that material. The term for casting, as we have stated, was “fundere,” and is always used when real casting in brass or other metal is spoken of; but nowhere is the term “fundere” applied to any work in gypsum. “Ars fundendi æro” is constantly spoken of,—“ars fundendi gypso” never. Besides, the very phrase “ex gypso plastico opere perfecit” is at variance with casting. The words “plastico” and “opere” mean modeling, and nothing else.

But throughout this paper by Mr. Perkins these two completely distinct processes are constantly confounded with each other. It suffices for him to find a statement in an ancient writer that anything is made in plaster, or even an allusion to a plaster statue, and at once he jumps to the conclusion that the statue was necessarily cast, and not shapen or modeled.

“It remains for us now,” he says, “to establish by undeniable proof how little foundation there is for the opinion of those who pretend that the ancients did not make use of plaster for casting, supporting their opinion on the complete absence of statues and statuettes in plaster, or fragments of any kind found in excavations, when nevertheless thousands of objects of the frailest kind are found, such as stuccoes, vases, terra cotta, glass, wax heads, etc. If it be true that the inclemencies of weather and atmospheric agents could cause the disappearance of plaster saturated with humidity, or placed in conditions favorable to its destruction, it does not necessarily follow that these conditions always reproduce themselves. It suffices, to convince one’s self of this, to glance at the plates 67, 76, 85, in the magnificent work published at St. Petersburg on the antiquities of the Cimmerian Bosphorus. These plates represent plasters preserved in the Museum of the Hermitage, coming from a tomb on Mount Mithridates opened in 1832, and from another tomb at Kertch excavated in 1843. These plasters date back to the fourth century before our era.22 Adorned with various colors and executed in relief, they were destined to be attached as ornaments to other objects, such as sarcophagi, pilasters, walls, etc.”

Well! what if they were? Is this any proof that they were cast? Mr. Perkins is easily satisfied, if he is assured of this fact by looking at engraved plates. Are they all of the same size? Are they identical, as they would be if they were cast from the same mould, or are they like all other plaster and stucco work of the ancients of which we are cognizant,—ornaments modeled by hand? or are they pressures from a flat, shallow mould, like the ectypa? If the latter, they are almost unique; and so far they prove that the artists who made them understood this first and simplest process of casting, or rather of stamping. But from plates it would be impossible to determine this fact, and Mr. Perkins gives us no reason to think they are unlike all the other ancient stucco work. He does not profess to have seen and examined them for himself; at all events, one fact is clear, that these, if they are in plaster, are painted plaster.

In the British Museum there exist some of these so-called casts in plaster from Cyrenaica and from Kertch. Undoubtedly they are nearer to being true casts than anything else which has as yet been discovered; but, after all, a careful examination of them will show that they are not casts in the legitimate sense of the word, but merely stamps for a mould, and fashioned in precisely the same way that was employed in making the hollow terra cottas. To make these, a very rude stamp was executed, with no under-cuttings of any kind, everything being filled up which could impede the removal of the clay, which was pressed into the stamp, then carefully extracted again and finished by hand. All the terra cotta reliefs called ectypa were made in this way, and some of the moulds still exist,—not one of them, however, in plaster. The same process was employed to make some of the figures of terra cotta in the round, by making a mould of two pieces divided in the middle, of a very generalized form, with no under-cuttings. Into each of these moulds a quantity of clay was squeezed; the two parts were then removed carefully, and joined together. A general form was thus obtained, and the artist proceeded to model and to finish it with more or less care. In this way not only ectypa were made in clay and afterwards baked, but also small flat ornaments which were afterwards appliqué, or fastened on to flat or round surfaces,—as on to cista. This is the process by which fragments of the figures from Cyrenaica and Kertch in the British Museum were made. The junction of the two halves is clear. The work is very rude; there are no under-cuttings; everything is filled up which would in the least impede the withdrawal of the material from the stamp. There is, for instance, an arm and hand, with the interstices of the fingers quite filled up. But what clearly proves that these figures were not cast, as distinguished from stamped, is the head. Here the hair being adorned with a wreath with under-cuttings, it could not be withdrawn from the stamp without destroying it, and it is entirely appliqué, or worked on to the head after it was removed. Had it been cast, there would have been no such difficulty. Nor, again, is it quite clear that the material of these figures is pure gypsum. It would rather seem to be a mixture of gypsum with white clay, or argilla, to give it flexibility, and enable it to be withdrawn from the mould. Indeed, it may here be observed that it is in every way probable that the gypsum used by the ancients in modeling and ornamental work was differently prepared from that which we now use, and was mixed with some material which prevented it from setting rapidly, and gave it strength, ductility, and plasticity. Otherwise it is difficult to see how such works as those in the tombs of the Via Latina, which no one can doubt are modeled by hand, could have been executed with at once so much finish and freedom. Gypsum, as we use it, would set too soon to enable us to work it in such a manner. In the tombs of the Via Latina which were lately discovered, it is worked as freely as if it were clay, and was plainly so prepared as to enable the artist to take his own time in modeling, without fear of its hardening—or, as we call it, setting—immediately.

This, then, is nothing new. It is not casting, and these figures are not casts. They are stamps, just like the ectypa of terra cotta. We know that κοροκόσμια or dolls were anciently made in this way of wax and gypsum, or of terra cotta; and these are κοροκόσμια.

To infer from the fact that the Greeks knew and practiced the art of pressing into shallow moulds of stone, without under-cuttings, either clay, pitch, wax, or plaster, that they also understood and practiced the art of making moulds and casts from life or from the round is utterly unwarrantable. Nothing is more simple than the one art, while the other is extremely complex. The one is merely like making an impression from a seal, which would naturally suggest itself to the first person who left the pressure of his foot in clay or mud; the other requires various processes of calculation and invention. In inventions it is not always or ordinarily the first step which costs, but the subsequent and calculated steps. Centuries often elapse between the first step and the second. A remarkable instance of this is to be found in the history of the invention of printing. The first steps to this wonderful art were taken by the ancient Romans; the very process by which we now print was known and practiced by them; but the application of it to the printing of books does not seem to have occurred to their minds. It cannot, however, but appear most extraordinary that the idea of printing should not have occurred to them when we consider the facts of the case. Pliny relates that Cato published a book containing portraits of distinguished persons of his time, of which there were many copies; and so far as we can conjecture, these copies were probably stamped on parchment or some such material, and afterwards colored. Putting this together with the fact that ancient bricks have been lately found in Rome with names and numbers stamped upon them by means of movable types, so that the numbers or letters could be arranged at will, we might absolutely state that the ancient Romans understood and practiced the art of printing. They certainly did print on their brick; they probably stamped the portraits of cuts in their books,—but so far as we know they never united the processes, and never stamped a book with movable types. Adopting Mr. Perkins’s method of argument, we might declare, however, that the mere fact that none of these printed books have ever come down to us was entirely inconclusive, since these books might have utterly perished; while we have the clearest proof that they did print with movable types on brick, and therefore it is plain that they invented printing. The step from one of these processes to the other does indeed seem so evident, so natural, almost so inevitable, that we are puzzled to imagine how they could ever have overlooked it. Yet there is little doubt that they did. But from the simple fact of stamping in clay or plaster to the complex process of making moulds and casts in the round requires not one step but many, and each one of them requires calculation and invention. Indeed, if the art were now to be lost, it would be easy to conceive that centuries might pass before it would be reinvented.

In the collection of Mr. Fol of Rome, of which we have heretofore spoken, there are some interesting fragments of ancient statuettes in the round, very carefully finished in plaster, being the leg and thigh of one, and the half-breast and a portion of the torso of another. These are as carefully finished as if they were in marble, but they are elaborately worked by hand in the plaster, and not cast. These are exceedingly interesting as showing the method of the ancients in working in plaster, and they clearly illustrate the process of Lysistratus as described by Pliny,—the only difference being that the surface is of gypsum and not of wax, or color. The interior or core of these fragments, which is solid, is of lime, or a coarse kind of gypsum, and over the surface of this core is spread a thin coating of fine gypsum, which has been elaborately worked and smoothed on while it was fluid. The touches and creases on the surface are those of a modeler’s hand and stick, and it differs in every way from a cast. It is therefore plain that the artist first made a core, or rough “imaginem” or “formam,” of coarse gypsum, and that he improved, emended, and finished the surface, not by means of “cera infusa in eam formam gypsi,” but of gypsum spread over it,—just as Lysistratus did. The language of Pliny is an exact description of this process.

Again, a strong negative indication that gypsum was not used for casting, or indeed to any extent in modeling, is to be found in the chapter by Pliny on gypsum. “Its use is,” he says, “to whitewash [or parget], and to make small figures to ornament houses, and for wreaths.” He also adds that it is a good medicine for pains in the stomach; but he entirely omits to mention that it was ever used for casting. Is it possible to believe that if it were so used he would not have alluded even to such a fact? Would it be conceivable that at the present day a chapter could be written on plaster of Paris, omitting its employment for the purpose of casting? After giving us this enumeration of the uses to which gypsum is applied, Pliny goes on to describe its nature, tell where it is found, and name the different kinds; and he concludes with no allusion to any other use than what he has previously stated.

Again, Pliny in the chapter on Lysistratus—which it must be remembered is devoted to modeling—mentions one fact which seems to be inconsistent with any knowledge at that time of casting. Arcesilaus, he says, modeled a drinking-cup or mixing-bowl in plaster, which he sold to Octavius, a Roman knight,23 for a talent (£250). It is impossible to believe that such an enormous price would have been given for a mere plaster bowl. If the process of casting from it was then understood, Arcesilaus might have repeated it in cast a thousand times, and the original and the cast being in the same material, one would have been quite as good as the other, if retouched. Yet he seems only to have made one, and to have asked a talent for that. Again, Lucullus made a contract with this same artist to model for him in plaster a statue of Fabatus, for which he agreed to pay him no less than 60,000 sesterces, or £530.

It is worth noting, too, as a curious fact, that just at the very time when Lysistratus is supposed to have invented plaster-casting, the art of brass-casting began to decline in character and style, and soon after seems to have died out and been lost; at all events, Pliny tells us that soon after the 120th Olympiad the art perished,—“cessavit deinde ars.” And as Lysistratus lived only about twenty-five years previously, it would be singular to find one of these arts dying out just as the other was being developed.

Mr. Perkins also thinks it valuable to tell us that Canova was of opinion that the sculptors of antiquity made finished sketches, and then by means of proportional compasses enlarged them and took points on the marble; and he adds, “We should weigh these words of a great sculptor who devoted himself to the most minute researches on this subject, as well as to everything that had relation to the fine arts.”

We agree that we should weigh the words of this distinguished sculptor, though we were not aware before that he was a profound archæologist, or had made minute researches on this subject. But how in any way does this tend to prove that the ancient Greeks and Romans knew how to cast in plaster? We are equally unable to see the precise bearing on this question of the fact also stated by him, that the drill is supposed by some to have been invented by Callimachus, and by others to have been used long before; or that the pointing of a statue was probably known to the Greeks, and certainly to the Romans.

Yet in a certain way the opinion of Canova that the ancients made small sketches, and by proportional compasses transferred their proportions, measures, and general forms to their large works, has an argumentative relation to the subject different from what Mr. Perkins probably supposed. This opinion is undoubtedly well founded, and accepting it as such, what does it indicate? That the process of casting in plaster was known to the ancients? By no means. So far as it goes, it proves diametrically the opposite,—as Mr. Perkins might have seen, had he weighed the words of this great sculptor.

In fact, this leads us to one of the strongest arguments against the opinion apparently advocated by Mr. Perkins. Had the ancients known how to cast in plaster from the model, as they knew how to cast in bronze, this process of making small statuettes and enlarging therefrom would have been quite unnecessary. They would thus have escaped the incorrectness which is unavoidable in such a process, by at once making their models of full size, and completely finishing them in clay or other plastic material before transferring them to the marble. Their process probably was to make a small statuette in clay, and then bake it or dry it. But in transferring proportionally this small figure into a large one, an objection occurs. Defects scarcely perceptible in a small figure become gross defects when multiplied into a large one. Not only variations of one eighth of an inch more or less in small particulars in a figure a foot high would alter entirely the relative proportions of a figure eight feet high, but other inaccuracies inevitably occurring in enlarging by proportional compasses would increase these disproportions, so that the increased figure would be invariably untrue in its effect and in its measures. Now this is precisely what is apparent to any one who carefully studies the antique statues. Even in works showing the highest artistic knowledge and skill, the want of correspondence of measures and proportions between the two sides of the figure is very manifest; and the larger they are the more this is exhibited. Thus, to take one of the highest examples, in the Theseus we find astonishing knowledge and artistic skill in treatment, beside disagreements of measurement in corresponding parts, which are evidently the result of the defective mechanical process of enlargement. The legs are beautifully modeled, but of unequal length,—one being much longer in the thigh than the other. The same observation is true of the clavicle, and indeed throughout the statue. Now even an inferior artist would have seen and avoided these mistakes in modeling the statue full size, but the defect would be easily passed over by the eye in the small sketch, particularly if the statuette were merely a sketch, as was in all probability the usual case. It would be difficult to believe that an artist with the mastery shown in this statue would not have seen and corrected these mistakes, had the model of this figure been of the same size. This of course he perceived after the points were taken in the marble and the work was roughed out, but then it was too late to remedy them. This difficulty he and all other artists must constantly have felt. The question was how to avoid it. Nothing could have been more simple, if the modern process of casting in plaster from the clay model had been known to them. They would simply have modeled the statue in clay of its full size, cast it in plaster, and been sure of its exact proportions and measures.

Let us take one step further. Had they understood the modern process of casting in plaster from the clay or from a statue, they could from the cast have multiplied in marble the same statue any number of times, identically or with such minute differences as few eyes could perceive. The repliche in a modern sculptor’s studio are scarcely to be distinguished from each other, and there would have been no difficulty in doing the same thing in an ancient sculptor’s studio. What is the fact known? So far from this being the case, not only are there comparatively very few repliche even of the most famous statues, for which there would necessarily be a great demand, but even in the various repliche which we have there are not only no two which approach to identity either in attitude or in size, but one can scarcely say of any of them that the artist had more at best than a vivid recollection of the original or of some other replica, much less that he had it before him to copy even by eye. Often the attitude is changed, as well as the size and proportions; sometimes the action is reversed; and in all cases such differences exist as it is impossible that the clumsiest workman could have made with a cast of the original before him. Nor do we read or hear of any copies in our sense of copy; that is, exact reproduction of any of the great works of the great sculptors. Look, for instance, at the Venus of the Capitol and the Venus de Medici and the St. Petersburg Venus; they are all repliche of the renowned statue by Praxiteles, but beyond the general attitude there is no resemblance, not so much as any clever artist of to-day could make from mere recollection. Look again at the portrait busts; how many are there of Marcus Aurelius, Octavius Cæsar, and Lucius Verus!—and no two of them approaching identity. Of the thousands of statues which have been excavated, no two are exact copies from the same model. There is at best nothing more than a family resemblance among those which are most alike. Would this be possible, if the ancients knew and practiced the art of casting in plaster as we do? It would seem to be utterly impossible, or at least improbable to the highest degree.

Again, why should not the great artists themselves, or their scholars, have made repliche of their famous statues? Nothing would have been easier had there been any casts from them. They were greatly coveted, and the prices paid for the original works were enormous,—so enormous that the largest prices of our day shrink into insignificance beside them. For the famous nude Venus by Praxiteles, Athens, in her extreme desire to possess it, offered in exchange to pay the whole public debt of the state to which it belonged. This offer, however, was peremptorily refused. Yet what could have been more easy, had a cast of it been in existence, or had they known how to make one, than for Praxiteles or his scholars to have made an exact replica, fully equal to the original or even superior to it, with additional touches of the master’s hand? That this was never done, or hinted at, proves that, the statue once having passed out of the artist’s hands, he could repeat it from memory only by aid of his sketch; and this would not only have cost him as much labor as making a new statue, but would in no sense have been identical. Again, is it to be supposed that if Polyclitus had an absolute cast of his life-size statue of the Doryphoros which would have enabled him to repeat it with exactness, the original would have commanded such a price as one hundred talents, or £25,000? Or is it possible to suppose that Arcesilaus would have received a gold talent (£250) for a plaster bowl which could have been repeated by casting, for almost nothing? It was because it was modeled, and the modern process of casting in a piece-mould was unknown, that it commanded such a price. Here making a rude stamp without under-cuttings would not suffice. The finesse of the work could not be given, and the work would have been destroyed or greatly injured in the attempt.

If it be a fact that the Greeks and Romans knew this process, one would naturally expect to find at least some fragments of casts or moulds in plaster of their great works,—as for instance of their small and exquisite Corinthian bronzes, if not of their large figures. But, so far as we are aware, nothing of the kind has ever been found. The whole city of Pompeii in the height of its luxury was buried under a fall of ashes, which for many long centuries preserved the most refined, fragile, and delicate utensils and works of art; and it is but a few years since that we removed these ashes and explored its houses and rooms which had been untouched since that fatal calamity befell them of which Pliny gives us so vivid an account. It is on the statements of the younger Pliny himself that those rely who claim that the ancients knew and practiced casting in plaster. Long before his day, then, this art had been invented; and we should naturally expect to find some specimens of it in this city of luxury, among its pictures, its vases, its statues, and its glass. But in all Pompeii there has not been found a vestige of a casting in plaster. Its stuccoes still remain, the bas-reliefs worked in plaster on its walls are still uninjured, its paintings are still fresh, its vases unbroken, its household utensils perfect. Hermetically sealed up under that mound of ashes, there was nothing to injure a cast in any house, if it existed. But there is absolutely nothing of the kind. Yet this was a people devoted to art, and whose houses were filled with knick-knacks of every kind. We find the sculptor’s studio, but there is not a cast in it, nor is there the shop of a caster. It is plain, therefore, that there was not a cast in Pompeii.

But if anywhere there were casts from the round there were also piece-moulds from the round. Where are they? Has any person ever heard of one? Now a hollow cast is comparatively a fragile object; but a plaster mould, saturated as it must be with oil, is anything but a fragile object. Sheltered from the inclemencies of storm and rain, it would last for thousands of years, and would even resist a century of exposure to the weather of Italy. But not underground nor aboveground anywhere has such a thing been found. Whatever moulds have been found are fit only for mere stamping. They are extremely rude, without under-cuttings, and seem merely to give a general shape. They are not cast upon anything, but worked out by hand, and are not in plaster. They are all small; nothing ever has been found which is either a mould, or a cast from life, or from a statue, or from a vase or bowl, or any careful work of art.

An ancient manufactory of terra cotta has been lately discovered and unearthed at Arezzo in Tuscany, and a large number of moulds was found, taken apparently from vases executed originally on some hard metal, probably in silver. The figures on these moulds are of the most exquisite design and execution, and for beauty and delicacy of finish exceed anything which remains to us of Greek or Etruscan art. There are no under-cuttings, and the relief is so low and flat as to yield an impression scarcely, if at all, higher than a seal or intaglio. All these moulds, however, are in terra cotta. Not one is in plaster, though in this material they could have been executed more easily and exactly, and could have been reproduced in the original size. Of course, first taken, as they were, in soft clay, then baked, they of necessity shrank in size and were subject to warping and cracking, all which defects would have been avoided had they been made in plaster. All this would indicate that the use of plaster in making moulds was not practiced at that period, even in such a simple operation as this.

In face of this we must say we do not agree with Mr. Perkins when he thinks he “establishes by undeniable proof how little founded is the opinion of those who pretend that the ancients did not practice casting in plaster,—sustaining it by the complete absence of statues and statuettes of plaster or fragments of any kind in the excavations, when nevertheless thousands of objects are found of the most fragile nature;” and especially when the undeniable proof which he offers is the existence of some works and arabesque ornaments in plaster found at Kertch, and supposed to belong to the fourth century before the Christian era, and which apparently he has never seen. On the contrary, we should like to know how he explains the fact that no indubitable ancient moulds or castings have ever been found.