The “Etruscan” theory was first promulgated by Montfaucon, Gori, Caylus, and Passeri, between 1719 and 1752; their arguments being based on the plausible ground that up till that time the vases had been found almost exclusively in Etruria. So the term “Etruscan vase” passed into the languages of Europe, and has survived in spite of a century of refutation. But in 1763 Winckelmann, the father of scientific archaeology, conceived the idea that the spirit and character of the vase-paintings were wholly Greek; and he proposed to call them Italo-Greek or Graeco-Sicilian, indicating Magna Graecia as the true place of their manufacture. This was a step in the right direction, and he was supported later by Lanzi, Millin, Millingen, and others (1791–1813). A further attempt was made to define the particular places of their fabric, and Nola, Locri, and Agrigentum were suggested as the most important centres. Meanwhile, the discoveries of vases in Attica, at Corinth, and elsewhere in Greece, and subsequently the publication of Stackelberg’s work, helped to confirm the position of Winckelmann’s followers.
In 1828 came what M. Pottier terms “an objectionable revival of Etruscomania,” with the extensive and marvellously fruitful excavations at Vulci under the direction of the Prince of Canino, Lucien Bonaparte, on whose estates most of the tombs were found. Several thousand vases were the yield of this site, mostly of the best periods of Greek art. This was a great epoch in the history of the study of Greek vases. A flood of fresh light was thrown on the subject by the mass of new material, and a whole new literature arose in consequence. Hitherto vases of the archaic and fine periods had only been known in isolated instances, and the bulk of the existing collections was formed of the florid vases of the Decadence; but now it became possible to fill up the gaps and trace the whole development of the art from the simplest specimens with decorative patterns or figures of animals down to the very last stages of painting.
These discoveries prompted Prince Lucien Bonaparte to revive the theory of Etruscan origin, in which he was supported by D'Amatis and De Fea. It is probable that all three were animated more by patriotic motives than by intellectual conviction. At any rate their arguments appealed but little to scholars, although not a few inclined to take a middle course, and maintained that there existed, not only in Etruria but also in Southern Italy, various local centres of manufacture under Greek superintendence and in close connection with Athens and her influences. These ideas were upheld by Gerhard, Welcker, the Duc de Luynes, and Ch. Lenormant. But the preponderating arguments were to be found on the other side, from Kramer (1837), who attributed all vases but those of the Decadence to an Attic origin, O. Müller, who limited this to the finer examples from Vulci, and Raoul-Rochette, who pinned his faith to Sicily, to Otto Jahn[[34]], who may be said to have founded the modern comparative study of Greek ceramics on its present basis (1854).
Jahn pronounced decisively for the Greek origin of all but the later fabrics, and his principles have been adopted by all succeeding archaeologists, with the exception of Brunn, and one or two of the latter’s disciples, who have swung back to the Italian theory in some respects. Up to his time all had been in chaos, and each writer worked on his own particular line without regard to others, both as regards the origin of the vases and the subjects depicted thereon; but Jahn, in his epoch-making catalogue of the vases at Munich, was the first to make a serious and scientific attempt to reduce the chaos to order, not only by adopting a rational system of interpretation, but by systematising and reducing to one common denominator all previous contributions to knowledge.
We may say that the study of Greek vases has passed through three main stages: (1) Artistic; (2) Epexegetic; (3) Historical.
(1) Artistic (1690—1770).—In the first stage, as we have seen, the artistic merit of the vases and the aim of producing a pretty picture were alone regarded. Hence, too, arose the fashion of making copies of Greek vases, and many specimens were produced by Wedgwood[[35]], bearing, however, no more than a superficial likeness to the originals.
(2) Epexegetic (1770—1854).—In the second stage it seems to have been suddenly discovered that the figures on the vases were not mere meaningless groups, like the Watteau shepherds and shepherdesses on Dresden china, and many strange theories were at first promulgated as to the purposes for which the vases were made and the subjects thereon depicted. Three main lines of interpretation seem to have been adopted by the writers of this period:—
(a) Passeri, Millin, Lanzi, and Visconti supposed that allusions were made to the life of the deceased person in whose tomb they were found; allegorical representations were given of his childish games, his youthful pastimes, or the religious and social ceremonies in which he took part.
(b) Italynski, in his preface to Tischbein’s work, enunciates the strange notion that they allude to events of Greek and Roman history: for instance, three draped men represent the three chief archons of Athens, or three women conversing, Veturia, the mother of Coriolanus, with her daughter and daughter-in-law, considering whether she should appear as a suppliant before her son. The utterly fantastic and unscientific nature of these explanations was self-evident; the writers of the first group at any rate had a sounder basis for their theories, and on the analogy of the sculptured Greek tombstones might well have been near the truth.
(c) Another theory, which attained great popularity, and was even adhered to partially for some years afterwards by Panofka, Gerhard, and Lenormant, was that the subjects bore allusion to the Mysteries, more particularly the Eleusinian. The vases were regarded as presents given to the initiated, and the reason why their interpretation was so difficult was that they related to the secrets unfolded in those ceremonies. Many attempts were made to unlock those secrets and to show the mystic moral purport of the pictures; but all is the merest guesswork. The height of fantastic explanation is perhaps reached by Christie, whose work is quite worth perusal as a literary curiosity. Panofka, on the other hand, turned his attention to the inscriptions on the vases,[[36]] and discerned a symbolical meaning in these, reading into the names of artists rebuses on the subjects over which they were inscribed, e.g. Douris is indicated by Athena with a spear (δόρυ) or Hermaios by a figure of Hermes.