THE famous French painter David happened to be in exile at the time of the discovery of the Venus of Milo, and, taking an especial interest in this wonderful piece of ancient art, he induced one of his disciples, a certain Debay, to have his son Auguste Debay, a young art student, make a drawing of the statue as soon as it was put up in the Louvre. This drawing was afterwards published by M. de Clarac in his “Notice” and we here republish it on account of the importance it has gained as a document in the history of the statue.
Debay’s drawing shows a plinth bearing an inscription and also exhibiting a square hole in the ground near the left foot of the statue. The angle of vision is indicated by the line “xx” which shows the height from which the statue was viewed by M. Debay. The point a corresponds to the place of the eye projected horizontally at a distance in front which cannot have been more than one and one-half times the height of the statue. Geometrically this place is determined by the intersection of two lines
DEBAY’S DRAWING OF VENUS.
from a and b constructed in a horizontal plane at right angles to the vertical axis of the statue.
The inscription on the pedestal of M. Debay’s drawing reads:
...—ΑΝΔΡΟΣ ΗΝΙΔΟΥ
... ΙΟΧΕΥΣΑΠΟΜΑΙΑΝΔΡΟΥ
ΕΠΟΙΗΣΕΝ
“ ... andros son of Menides of [Ant]iochia on the Maiandros.”
Since of the last missing letter before the Α the lowest stroke of a Greek Ξ or of an Σ is discernible in the drawing, the name must have read “Alexandros” or “Agesandros.” This man cannot have lived before the third century B. C. because his native city Antioch on the Maeander was founded by Antiochus I, the second of the Diadochs (280-261 B. C.) According to Professor Kirchhoff’s view the character of the letters belongs to the first century and may in his opinion be dated back at most to the middle of the second century B. C.