[11] Hic primus species exprimere instituit, Pliny xxxv. 36, as species in the sense Harduin takes it, 'oris et habitus venustas,' cannot be refused to Polygnotus, and the artists immediately preceding Apollodorus, it must mean here the subdivisions of generic form; the classes.
At this period we may with probability fix the invention of local colour, and tone; which, though strictly speaking it be neither the light nor the shade, is regulated by the medium which tinges both. This, Pliny calls 'splendour.' To Apollodorus Plutarch ascribes likewise the invention of tints, the mixtures of colour and the gradations of shade, if I conceive the passage rightly: Ἀπολλοδωρος ὁ Ζωγραφος Ἀνθρωπων πρωτος ἐξευρων φθοραν και ἀποχρωσιν Σκιας, (Plutarch, Bellone an pace Ath., &c. 346.) This was the element of the ancient Ἁρμογη, that imperceptible transition, which, without opacity, confusion, or hardness, united local colour, demitint, shade, and reflexes.
[12] 'Pinxit et monochromata ex albo.' Pliny, xxxv. 9. This Aristotle, Poet. c. 6, calls λευκογραφειν.
[13] In lineis extremis palmam adeptus——minor tamen videtur, sibi comparatus, in mediis corporibus exprimendis. Pliny, xxxv. 10. Here we find the inferiority of the middle parts merely relative to himself. Compared with himself, Parrhasius was not all equal.
[14] Theseus, in quo dixit, eundem apud Parrhasium rosa pastum esse, suum vero carne. Plin. xxxv. 11.
[15] The epithet which he gave to himself of Ἁβροδιαιτος, the delicate, the elegant, and the epigram he is said to have composed on himself, are known: See Athenæus, l. xii. He wore, says Ælian, Var. Hist. ix. 11. a purple robe and a golden garland; he bore a staff wound round with tendrils of gold, and his sandals were tied to his feet and ankles with golden straps. Of his easy simplicity we may judge from his dialogue with Socrates in Xenophon; ἀπομνημονευατων, 1. iii. Of his libidinous fancy, besides what Pliny says, from his Archigallus, and the Meleager and Atalanta mentioned by Suetonius in Tiberio, c. 44.
[16] In the portico of the Piræus by Leochares; in the hall of the Five-hundred, by Lyson; in the back portico of the Ceramicus there was a picture of Theseus, of Democracy and the Demos, by Euphranor. Pausan. Attic. i. 3. Aristolaus, according to Pliny, was a painter, 'è severissimis.'
[17] Cicero Oratore, 73. seq.—In alioque ponatur, aliudque totum sit, utrum decere an oportere dicas; oportere enim, perfectionem declarat officii, quo et semper utendum est, et omnibus: decere, quasi aptum esse, consentaneumque tempori et personæ; quod cum in factis sæpissime, tum in dictis valet, in vultu denique, et gestu, et incessu. Contraque item dedecere. Quod si poeta fugit, ut maximum vitium, qui peccat, etiam, cum probam orationem affingit improbo, stultove sapientis: si denique pictor ille vidit, cum immolanda Iphigenia tristis Calchas esset, mæstior Ulysses, mæreret Menelaus, obvolvendum caput Agamemnonis esse, quoniam summum illum luctum penicillo, non posset imitari: si denique histrio, quid deceat quærit: quid faciendum oratori putemus?
M. F. Quintilianus, l. ii. c. 14.—Operienda sunt quædam, sive ostendi non debent, sive exprimi pro dignitate non possunt: ut fecit Timanthes, ut opinor, Cithnius, in ea tabula qua Coloten Tejum vicit. Nam cum in Iphigeniæ immolatione pinxisset tristem Calchantem, tristiorem Ulyssem, addidisset Menelao quem summum poterat ars efficere mærorem, consumptis affectibus, non reperiens quo dignè modo Patris vultum possit exprimere, velavit ejus caput, et sui cuique animo dedit æstimandum.
It is evident to the slightest consideration, that both Cicero and Quintilian lose sight of their premises, and contradict themselves in the motive they ascribe to Timanthes. Their want of acquaintance with the nature of plastic expression made them imagine the face of Agamemnon beyond the power of the artist. They were not aware that by making him waste expression on inferior actors at the expence of a principal one, they call him an improvident spendthrift and not a wise œconomist.