This passage would long ago have settled the question, had not the moderns been pre-occupied with the belief that the Greeks did not paint their statues. They, therefore, read the passage in another sense; many translators read “pictures” for “statues.” But the Greek word ανδριας signifies “statue,” and is never used to signify “picture.” It means statue, and a statuary is called the maker of such statues, ανδριαντοποιος. (Mr. Davis, in Bohn’s English edition of Plato, avoids the difficulty by translating it “human figures.”)
“This passage is decisive as far as it goes, but it does not touch the question of colouring the flesh. It proves that as late as Plato’s time it was usual to apply colour to the eyes of statues; and assuming, what is not stated, that marble statues are in question, we are brought to the same point as by the Æginetan marbles, of which the eyes, lips, portions of the armour and draperies were found coloured. I forget whether the hair was found to be coloured, but the absence of traces of colour on the flesh, while they were abundant elsewhere, indicates that if coloured at all it must have been by a different and more perishable process—by a tint, or stain, or varnish. The Æginetan statues being archaic, do not give an absolute rule for those of Phidias. The archaic Athenian bas-relief of a warrior in excellent preservation, shows vivid colours on drapery and ornaments of armour, and the eye-balls were also coloured; but again, there is no trace of colour on the flesh.”—W. W. Lloyd.
Here is a passage which not only establishes the sense of the one in Plato, but while unequivocally declaring that the ancients painted their statues gives the reason why the paint is so seldom discoverable in the antique remains. It is from Plutarch (“Quæst. Roman.” xcviii., at the end): “It is necessary to be very careful of statues, otherwise the vermilion with which the ancient statues were coloured will quickly disappear.”
“This passage refers to archaic sacred figures, and at Rome (not in Greece), where after providing for the sacred geese and ganders, the first duty of certain officials on taking office was to furbish the agalma, or statue, which was necessary on ‘account of the quick fading of the vermilion with which they used to tinge the archaic statues.’ This is an accurate translation and a literal—and implies a difference between the archaic and the more modern in respect of colour, though not necessarily excluding all colour from the latter.”—W. W. Lloyd.
Had this passage been generally known the dispute could never have maintained itself. There is nothing equivocal in the use of the word μιλτινον, which means “vermilion;” nothing which admits of doubt in the phrase ῳ τα παλαια των αγαλματων εχρωζον. And there are abundant notices extant which illustrate it. One will suffice. The celebrated marble statue of a Bacchante by Scopas is described as holding, in lieu of the Thyrsus, a dead roebuck which is cut open, and the marble represents living flesh. People have tried to explain this by saying that Scopas discovered coloured veins in the marble, which he used to indicate living flesh. The explanation is absurd. In the first place veins do not so run in marble as to represent flesh; in the second, unless statues were usually coloured, such veins, if they existed, would be regarded as terrible blemishes, and the very thing the Greeks are supposed to have avoided—viz., colour as representing reality—would have been shown.
But colour was used, as we know, and Pausanias (“Arcad.” lib. viii., cap. 39) describes a statue of Bacchus as having all those portions not hidden by draperies, painted vermilion, the body being of gilded wood. He also distinctly says that the statues made of gypsum were painted, describing a statue of Bacchus γυψου πεποιημενον, which was—the language is explicit—“ornamented with paint” επικεκοσμημενον γραφη.
“This statue was apparently ithyphallic, and probably archaic. Not drapery, but ivy and laurel, concealed the lower part of it. The colour of the exposed part was not local, but applied to the whole of it.”—W. W. Lloyd.
Virgil, in an epigram, not only offers Venus a marble statue of Amor, the wings of which shall be many-coloured and the quiver painted, but he intimates that this shall be so because it is customary—
Marmoreusque tibi, Dea, versicoloribus alis
In morem pictâ stabit Amor pharetrâ.