Volume II Part 21 (1/2)
This curiousthe first renascence of Egyptian art under the twelfth dynasty It was to last, and even to grow more conspicuous, until the centuries of final decadence The growing influence of conventionality is to be seen in other signs also As art repeated and multiplied its representations, and the spaces which it had to decorate increased in nuer nuroups and figures which were repeated without e In the decorations of this period we find long rows of figures which are practically identical with each other They look as if they had been produced by stencil plates With all their apparent richness and their wealth of i of Thebes show a poverty of invention which is not to be found in the art of the early dynasties[238]
[238] Some of our illustrations allow the justice of this observation to be easily verified (Figs 172, 253, and 254, Vol
I) In one of these the porters and in another the prisoners of war seeh the _Denkmaeler_ of Lepsius leaves a similar impression
We may mention especially plates 34, 35, 175, 125, and 135 of the third Part
The gradual falling off in their powers of observing and reproducing natural forularly well shown in their imperfect treatment of those animals which had been unknown to their predecessors The horse does not seeypt until the tih place ayptians He became one of the favourite thereat pictures of battle he occupies a central position, and he is always associated with the prowess of the sovereign And yet he is almost always badly drawn His our and even nobility, but his forated His head is well set on and his neck and shoulders good, but his body is weak and unsubstantial (Figs 13 and 174, Vol I)
The bad effects of conventionality are here strongly felt The same horse, in one of the two or three attitudes bethich the Egyptian sculptor had to choose according to the scene to be treated, appears everywhere The sculptors of the Memphite tombs saith a very different eye when they set themselves to surround the doubles of their ees of the domestic animals to whom they were accustomed in life
[Illustration: FIG 217--Funeral Dance Bas-relief in lioin]
The difference can be seen, however, without going back to the Ancient Ereat historical bas-reliefs of the temples and royal cenotaphs with the more modest decorations of certain private sepulchres, such as those which were found in the tomb of Chahteenth dynasty (Fig
218) The sculptors return with pleasure to those scenes of country life of which the pyra over their hoes, the sower casting his seed, the oxen attached to the plough and slowly cutting the furrow under the whip and voice of their drivers Neither men nor beasts are draith as sure a hand as in the tomb of Ti, but yet the whole appears more sincere than productions of a more official kind The oldest and ht ox, is at least er of the Theban battle pictures
[Illustration: FIG 218--Bas-relief froers of routine and of a conventional mode of work seem now and then to have been felt by the Theban artists They appear to have set themselves deliberately to rouse attention and interest by introducing foreign types into their eternal battle pieces, and by insisting upon their differences of feature, of complexion, of ar other countries and the strange aniiraffe pro tropical palms[239] But in spite of all these s like the primitive artists of Gizeh and Sakkarah, or even of Beni-Hassan Try as they will, they cannot conceal that soulless and ue the spectator If we turn over the pages of Lepsius, ays find ourselves dwelling with pleasure upon the sculptures from the mastabas, in spite of their apparent sih of the pompous and crowded bas-reliefs from Karnak, Luxor, the Ramesseum and Medinet-Abou
[239] So, at Dayr-el-Bahari the decorator has taken pains to give accurate reproductions of the fauna and flora of Punt See the plates of MARIETTE (_Dayr-el-Bahari_) and the reypten_, vol ii p 280)
These defects are less conspicuous in figures in the round, and especially in the statues of kings I do not know that the sculptors of the Setis and the Ra equal to the portraits of Thothmes, Amenophis, and Taia, but there are statues of Ra the fine exayptian art The features of no prince that ever existed were reproduced more often than those of this Ra These reproductions, as reatly in value
In the huge colossi which sit before the Great Te 248, Vol I), the limbs are not modelled with the careful precision which would be required in the case of a life-size statue
The ars appear rather heavy on close inspection, and in a photograph those parts which are nearest to the cae for the rest of the figure But the heads are characterized by a breadth and freedoreat effect when looked at frohtful mildness and ie of a deified king, sitting as eternal guardian of the temple which his workmen had hewn out in the bowels of the mountain
Some discrimination must be exercised between the statues of Rameses which approach the natural size We do not look upon his portrait when a child, which is now in the Louvre, as a219) The noble lines of the profile, recalling his father Seti, are indeed his, but the eye is too large and the hands are treated with an elegance which is more than a little raved by his side show that he was already king, but we can see that he was still very young, not so er in his ht shoulder A statue at Boulak (Fig 220) shows signs of carelessness rather than of affectation In it Ra e, are all well s are quite shapeless
[Illustration: FIG 219--Portrait of Rameses II while a child, actual size Limestone In the Louvre]
[Illustration: FIG 220--Statue of Raood bas-reliefs date fro others we ether, which Champollion copied fro 221) The race characteristics are very well ro, with his thick lips, short nose, sloping brow, and woolly poll; the Asiatic, an assyrian perhaps, with his regular, finely-chiselled profile and his knotted head-dress, are easily recognized The ures is also happy, its only defect is its want of variety The same remarks may be applied to those sculptures on the external walls of the s to the legion of the Chardanes or Sharuten, the supposed ancestors of the Sardinians Their picturesque costuular arms have been described more than once A metal stem and a ball between two crescent-shaped horns surmount their helmets; they are tall and slender, with small heads and short round noses[240]
[240] CH BLANC, _Voyage dans la Haute-egypte_, p 74, pl 31
The finest statue of Rameses II that has come down to our ti 222) Its execution is most careful, and its state of preservation marvellous The head is full of individuality and distinction One of the king's sons is shown, on a very sainst the foot of his father's seat
[Illustration: FIG 221--Prisoners of war; Ramesseum From Champollion, pl 322]
Boulak possesses the upper part of a broken statue of Rameses, which is not inferior to this in artistic ularly pure and noble
Most of those who are authorities on the subject agree that art fell into decay towards the end of Ran of sixty-seven years Carried away by hisrapidly than well In his iun by using up the excellent architects and decorative artists left to him by his father
He left them no time to instruct pupils or to fore he found himself compelled to employ mediocrities ”The steles, inscriptions, and other nized at a glance by their detestable style,” says Mariette[241] With the fine bas-relief at Abydos which is reproduced in our Plate III, Vol I, Mariette contrasts another which is to be found in a neighbouring hall and represents Raure of Seti is expressed in the most delicate low relief, in the latter the contours of Rameses are coarsely indicated by a deeply-cut outline[242] So too M Charles Blanc: ”As we pass from the tomb of Seti I to those of Seti II and Rayptian art makes itself felt, partly in the character of the pictures, which no longer display the firnificance, of those which we admired in the toerated relief of the sculptures”[243]
[241] MARIETTE, _Voyage dans la Haute-egypte_, vol i p 72