Fig. 102.—Head of Pauline Bonaparte Borghese (Rome, Borghese Museum).
Fig. 103.—Profiles of microcephalics.
The lines of the facial angle have been traced upon the profile of the Discobolus, but the profile of Antinoous has been left untouched, in order that we may trace the same lines upon it in imagination, and thus judge of its perfect beauty (facing page ([270])).
Let us first examine these two Greek profiles, without stopping to analyse their separate characteristics, but considering them from the more general point of view of the facial profile in general. Reverting, instead, for our analytical study to the schematic figure shown in Fig. 104, we see that it also shows the line of the facial profile, that of orientation and the vertical, and that these lines form certain right-angled triangles; the right angle MPA is not the facial angle, any more than the corresponding angle shown in the Discobolus is the facial angle. It is said that Greek art considered the right angle as the perfect facial angle; but that is not true. In order to obtain the facial angle it is necessary to draw a third line (MS) which extends from the metopic point to the point of attachment of the nasal septum to the upper lip; this is the line of the facial profile, and the angle MSA is the facial angle. It is never a right angle (see the Discobolus), but it approaches very closely to a right angle. Let us examine the triangle MPS, bounded by the vertical, the line of profile and the line of orientation; it is right-angled at P. Hence, the sum of its other two angles must be equal to one right angle; but the upper angle, corresponding to the nasal aperture, is of only 15°, and consequently the facial angle is 75°. The facial angle of the Discobolus also, like that of Antinoous, like that of the normal human visage, is 75°.
Fig. 104.
Examine further this Fig. 104; in it the line of the facial profile, extending from the metopion to the septo-labial point also passes through the point corresponding to the attachment of the base of the nose (nasion).
The figure is schematic; but anyone who will trace it in imagination upon the profile of Cavalieri, or on that of the seated woman in the group of Neopolitan peasants, or on any of the classic profiles known in art as the Roman profile, will find that the nasal line, connecting the supra- and subnasal points, coincides with the line drawn from the subnasal point to the metopion. But if we observe the Greek profile of the Discobolus, we shall find that the line of profile does not coincide with the base of the nose, but passes behind it.