Animals in Greek Sculpture: A Survey by Gisela M. A. RichterReview by: A. D. FraserThe Art Bulletin, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Mar., 1931), p. 118Published by: College Art AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3045477 .

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REVIEWS

ANIMALS IN GREEK SCULPTURE: A SURVEY. By Gisela M. A. Richter. xii, 87 pp.; 66 pls. containing 236 figs.; ii drawings (unnumbered) in text. New York, Oxford University Press, 193o. $ io.

We seem to be fast approaching an unhappy state of affairs wherein it will be incumbent on a reviewer, not only to appraise the absolute degree of merit of a book published in America or England, but to estimate its value in relation to its price. In view of the latter consideration, it must be confessed that the purchaser of this book is the victim of a bad bargain. One expects rather more for ten dollars than a volume that may conveniently be carried in one's overcoat pocket! The archaeological handbooks pub- lished by Schoetz and Parrhysius, very similar in make-up, albeit bigger, are sold for 20 marks or less.

Miss Richter's book is, as the title frankly acknowledges, no more than a survey. At that, it is an extremely good account of the subject and should prove of service to the general reader no less than to the scholar. The illustrations are excellent and show no fewer than 24 varieties of animals (including one hybrid, the mule) together with a number of reptiles and birds. The author is, of course, less interested in natural history than in artistic presenta- tion. We do not find even the Greek names for the animals described. And yet it might puzzle the best of Classical scholars to declare on the spur of the moment the Greek for "zebu" or "hedgehog."

There is, thus, ample scope for more detailed work in this interesting field, which might be developed with special attention to its zoblogical aspects. The several breeds of horses, dogs, and so forth remain to be identified in the illustrations from the monuments.

To provide an abundant supply of illustrative material, the author has gone considerably beyond the confines of sculpture in the strict sense of the term. Indeed, less than half of the animals are taken from reliefs or sculptures in the round. The remainder are drawn from gems, coins, and occasionally terra cottas. It might not have been amiss to have included vase paintings and thus exploit all the departments of Greek art.

In spite of the exorbitant price of the book, it is very probable that the present small edition (750 copies) will be exhausted within the year. In view of the probability of a republication, I venture to offer a few suggestions touching matters of detail:

Pp. 6-7. The well-known relief in the Louvre of a lion attacking a bull (fig. 13) is dated by Miss Richter in the decade 460-50 B. C. on the basis of analogies presented by similar representations on coins of Acanthus. It may be questioned whether so definite a conclusion is altogether justified, particularly as the relief is probably of Thracian provenance while the coins are Macedonian. It cannot be

proved, I think, that coin engraving and relief sculpturing progressed always hand in hand, even in the same artistic center.

P. 12. The attitude of the bear on the Nereid monument (fig. 39) indicates that he is about to grapple the dog that confronts him rather than strike him with his paw.

P. 13. In view of the results of the recent researches of Mattingly, the term "Romano-Campanian coinage" might well be modified by the addition of "so-called," or alto- gether avoided.

P. 21. To one who has closely observed the movements of cattle, it is clear that the bull on the gem in Boston (fig. 9E) is not about to lick his hind-leg, but is about to scratch his face, or knock a fly off his nose, with his hind-foot.

P. 26. The little bronze goat in the British Museum (fig. 122) is scratching his back with his horn-not merely turning his head to one side.

P. 31. I cannot persuade myself that the opponent of the dog in the relief recovered from the wall of Athens is actually a cat (fig. i75). In The Art Bulletin, IV (1922),

pp. 141-2, I suggested that the animal is a pine marten (mustela martes), the "house cat" of the Greeks. The ears are not feline nor are they laid back like those of an angry cat; nor does the fur of the body and particularly of the tail stand upright. So good an artist as the one who made the relief would surely have attended to these matters. The pine marten makes, it is said, a formidable opponent for a good-sized dog. If there is any foundation for the generally accepted belief that the ailouros of the Greeks is the marten, it would be amazing if this animal did not appear in ancient art.

I think that there is reasonable cause to doubt whether any of Miss Richter's feline specimens are really domesti- cated cats. The examples from Tarentine coins (figs. I76, I77) are commonly regarded as Dionysiac panther cubs. The figure on the Boston gem (fig. 178) might equally well be a marten, so little detail is indicated. The creature on the Attic stele (fig. 179) seems to be feline, but the lack of a head makes certain identification impossible.

P. 36. For a description of the snake pillar of Delphi the reader is here referred to Poulsen's Delphi (192o). Since the Hippodrome in Constantinople, to which the pillar was transferred in antiquity, has recently been excavated and the pillar completely exposed, a preferable reference would be to the Report on the Excavations (1927) or to Antiquity, IV (193o).

The "faults escaped," typographical or otherwise, are somewhat numerous but of little consequence. An errata slip which is inclosed takes care of 20 of them; I have noticed 7 or 8 others.

A. D. Fraser

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