Oldalképek
PDF
ePub

gold. He had learned the Greeks to dig for them, to draw from thence the metal, and to prepare it . He also made copper known to them, and the manner of working it". This fentiment is even fupported by the name which in all times they have given to one of the principal alloys which enters into the preparation of copper. Calamine or Cadmia, which is of great ufe to refine that metal, and to augment its weight, had received from Cadmus the name which it bore formerly, and which it retains even at this day .

We are ignorant by whom, and at what time the art of working filver had been brought into Greece. I fhould incline alfo to give Cadmus the honour of the re-establishment of that part of metallurgy. I ground it upon this, that Herodotus tells us, that Mount Pangaus, where Cadmus found mines of gold, contained alfo mines of filver.

It is therefore with fome fort of reafon, that this prince has paffed, in the writings of most authors, for the first who had fhewn to the Greeks the art of working metals; and it is not difficult, as we fee, to reconcile the different traditions which have been preferved in Greece about the origin of that discovery. There is nothing contradictory in it. In effect, though the knowledge of the arts had perished with the Titans, there were nevertheless preferved fome traces of them. Some writers had collected them, and tranfmitted to us the history of them. Others have neglected these ancient traditions, or perhaps were ignorant of them. They have therefore attributed to the chiefs of the laft colonies who came into Greece, the discovery of many arts of which they were only the restorers.

We do not meet with the fame divifion nor the fame diverfity of opinions about the time in which the Greeks knew and learned to work iron. The ancients agree fufficiently to place this discovery under the reign of Minos the First ©, 1431 years before Chrift. This knowledge had passed from Phry↑ Plin. 1. 7. fe&t. 57. p. 414.; Clem. Alex. ftrom. 1. 1. p. 363. See alfo Herod. 1. 7. n. 6. & 12.

b Hygin. fab. 274.; Strabo, 1. 14. p. 998.

• In Latin Cadmea. See Plin. 1. 34. fect. 2. & 22. • Marm. Oxon. ep. 11.

L. 7. n. 6. & 12.

E e 2

gia

gia into Europe, with the Dactyli, when they quitted the neighbourhood of Mount Ida to come and fettle in Crete £. Nevertheless it does not appear that the art of working iron had been much extended in Greece. It was originally with the Greeks as with all people of antiquity. They used copper for most of the things for which at present we use iron. At the time of the war of Troy not only arms, but even all tools, and all the inftruments of mechanic arts, were of copper. Iron was then fo efteemed, that in the games which Achilles caufed to be celebrated in honour of Patroclus, he proposed as a confiderable prize a ball of that metal. Homer speaks always of it with great diftinction *.

With regard to tin, it was by commerce with the Phoenicians the Greeks had procured that metal. They made great use of it in the heroic ages. I fhall have occasion to speak of it more particularly in the article of commerce and navigation.

It appears, that, at the times which we are now speaking of, the art of working gold, filver, and copper had made a very great progress among the Greeks. We fee, by the writings of Homer, that these people knew at that time all the inftruments proper for the fabric of these metals 1. I referve the detail of all these practices for the following chapter, where I shall treat of the knowledge the Greeks had in gold work in the ages of the war of Troy.

CHA P. V.

Of defigning, graving, chafing, gold work, and Sculpture.

WE are ignorant in what time defign, and the arts which have relation to it, took their rife among the

Ephorus, apud Diod. 1. 5. p. 38r.; Hefiod. apud Plin. 1. 7. fect. 57. p. 414. See infra, book 5. chap. 3.

[ocr errors]

Iliad. 1. 23. V. 118. &c.; Odyff. 1. 3. v. 433. 1. 5. v. 244.
Ihad. 1. 23. v. 826.

Ibid. 1. 7. v. 473. et paffim.

1 Odyff. 1. 3. v. 433.

Greeks.

Greeks. Antiquity has tranfmitted nothing to us that is fatisfactory on the origin of all thefe different difcoveries. They attribute to Love the first effay that Greece had seen of the art of defigning, and casting objects in earth.

A young girl violently fmitten with her lover from whom fhe was to be feparated for fome time, endeavoured to find ways to foften the rigour of absence. Taken up with this business, the remarked on the wall the fhadow of her lover, defigned by the light of a lamp. Love makes us ingenious. It inspired that young perfon with the idea of preferving that dear image, by drawing about the shadow a line which followed and marked exactly the contour. Hiftory adds, that our lover's father was a potter of Sycione, named Dibutade. This man having confidered the work of his daughter, applied clay on these ftrokes, by obferving the contours fuch as he faw them defigned: He made by this means a profile of earth which he burnt in his furnace m. We are not affured of the time in which this Dibutade lived. Some authors place him in very, remote ages".

Such had been, according to ancient tradition, the origin of defign and in figures of relief in Greece. We are ignorant of the confequence of this firft effay. We can fay nothing of the degrees that the greatest part of the arts which have relation to defign, went through fucceffively among the Greeks. We may conjecture, that these practices have not begun to make any great progrefs till after the arrival of the colonies conducted by Cecrops, Cadmus, &c. These princes came out of Egypt and Phoenicia, countries, where the arts concerning defign were known from time immemorial. Whatever it be, a number of facts reported by Homer fhew, that, in the ages we are now upon, the Greeks were inftructed in many arts which depended entirely upon defign.

They knew how to work in ivory, and apply it to diffe.

Plin. 1. 35. fe&t, 43. p. 710.

See Junius, in Catalog. p. 56.

rent

rent uses. They applied it to the adorning of chairs and other furniture P. Thefe works were of very great value, and much fought after. They must even then have had in Greece, artists diftinguished for their taste and skill. Homer fpeaks of one Icmalius, as of a workman who excelled in thefe forts of works 9.

gold work, that the We fee frequently

It is certain alfo, with refpect to Greeks knew many parts of that art. in the writings of Homer, the princes of Greece using cups, ewers, and bafons, of gold and filver. The fhield of Neftor was compofed of frames or sticks of gold. This prince had also a cup of pretty elegant workmanship. It was adorned with ftuds of gold, with two double handles, and other different ornaments. Homer farther speaks very often of workmen who knew how to mix gold with filver to make precious veffels . The Greeks knew alfo, in the heroic ages, the art of foldering these metals.

We might fay, that all these works, of which I have fpoken, had been brought into Greece from foreign countries. Yet I do not know that there is room to prefume it. Homer does not fay it. We know his exactness in this respect.

As to the art of ingraving metals, I do not think that the Greeks had then done any of these works. I ground this, firft, because there is never any mention made in Homer of rings or of feals. Secondly, on the ways which the Greeks, according to the relation of this poet, used to feal the trunks and the coffers in which they put their moft valuable effects. The ufe of locks and padlocks was entirely unknown to them. That one might not open their packets, without their knowing of it, they wrapped them round with cords very artfully tied. These fort of knots were used inftead of feals and fignets. They were fo ingeniously invented, and fo complicated, that he alone

• Odyff. 1. 4. v. 73. &c. 4 Ibid. 1. 19. v. 56. & 57. Ibid. 1. 11. v. 631. &c.

P Ibid. 1. 19. v. 56. & 1. 23. v. 200.
Iliad. 1. 8. v. 192. & 193.

Odyff. 1. 6. v. 232. &c.1. 23. v. 159. & 160.

who

who had made them could unloose and open them. Homer, to extol the fkill of Ulyffes in making these fort of fecurities, fays, that it was from Circe that he had learned the fecret". If the Greeks had then known the art of ingraving feals, they would not have had recourse to these knots, the common ufe of which must have been very incommodious and very troublesome.

Yet if we will believe certain authors, the Greeks, in the heroic times, had rings and feals in use. Plutarch speaks of the ring of Ulyffes, on which that hero had ingraved a dolphin. Helen, by the report of Hepheftion, cited by Photius, had for a feal a very uncommon ftone, the ingra ving of which reprefented a monftrous fith v. Polygnotus, laftly, a Greek painter, who flourished about 400 years before Chrift, in his picture of the descent of Ulyffes into hell, had painted young Phocus, having on one of the fingers of his left hand an ingraved stone fet in a ring of gold 2.

But thefe authors were too diftant from the times we are fpeaking of, for their teftimony to be capable of balancing the authority of Homer, the fole guide we ought to follow for the cuftoms and manners of the heroic ages. Pliny has been very fenfible of this. That great writer has not fuffered himself to be impofed upon. He has not hesitated to advance, that seals and rings were not in use at the time we are speaking of at present.

The Greeks were at that time ignorant of the art of drawing gold into wire, and of using it in gilding. The custom was anciently, to enrich with gold the horns of bulls or heifers which they offered in facrifice. Homer defcribes the nanner in which they proceeded at the time of the war of Troy ; it was on occafion of a facrifice offered by Neftor to Minerva. The poet fays, that they made a workman come to apply the gold on the horns of the victim. This man brought with him utenfils proper to perform that ope, ration. They confifted of an anvil, a hammer, and pincers.

* T. 2. p. 985. 2 Pauf. 1. 10. c. 30.

▪ Odysf. 1. 8. v. 447. &c.
Cod. 195. p. 493.
L. 33. fect. 4. p. 652. See alfo Hefych. voce giaπogaros.

Neftor

« ElőzőTovább »