Part 11

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.