Note 164 — Chapter II · (IX.)

Actual polish of the surface of a marble figure is to be avoided, as the reflections from it where it catches the light destroy the delicacy of the effect of light and shade. Greek marbles were not polished, save in some cases where the aim seems to have been to imitate the appearance of shining bronze, but the Greeks finished their marbles more smoothly than the sculptors of to-day, most of whom prefer a ‘sensitive’ surface on which the marks of the last delicate chiselling can be discerned. Michelangelo’s Dead Christ in the ‘Pietà’ of St. Peter’s, his most finished piece of marble work, may almost be said to show polish, and Renaissance marbles generally are quite as smoothly finished as antiques. In the case of coloured marbles, used for surface decoration in plain panels, polish is of course necessary in order that the colour and veining may appear, but it does not follow from this that a self-coloured marble, carved into the similitude of a face or figure, should be polished.