WAX FIGURES. Beeswax is possessed of properties which render it a most convenient medium for preparing figures and models, either by modelling or by casting in moulds. At ordinary temperatures it can be cut and shaped with facility; it melts to a limpid fluid at a low heat ; it mixes with any colouring matter, and takes surface tints well; and its texture and con sistency may be modified by earthy matters and oils or fats.
Figures in wax of their deities were used in the funeral rites of the ancient Egyptians, and deposited among other offerings in their graves; many of these are now preserved in museums. That the Egyptians also modelled fruits can be learned from numerous allusions in early literature. Among the Greeks during their best art period, wax figures were largely used as dolls for children ; statuettes of deities were modelled for votive offer ings and for religious ceremonies, and wax images to which magical properties were attributed were treasured by the people. Wax figures and models held a still more important place among the ancient Romans. The masks (effigies or imagines) of ances tors, modelled in wax, were preserved by patrician families, this jus imaginurn being one of the privileges of the nobles, and these masks were exposed to view on ceremonial occasions, and carried in their funeral processions. The closing days of the Saturnalia were known as Sigillaria, on account of the custom of making, towards the end of the festival, presents of wax models of fruit and waxen statuettes which were fashioned by the Sigillarii or manufacturers of small figures in wax and other media. The practice of wax modelling can be traced through the middle ages, when votive offerings of wax figures were made to churches, and the memory and lineaments of monarchs and great personages were preserved by means of wax masks as in the days of Roman patricians. In these ages malice and superstition found expression in the formation of wax images of hated persons, into the bodies of which long pins were thrust, in the confident expectation that thereby deadly injury would be induced to the person represented; and this belief and practice continued till the 17th century.
Indeed the superstition still survives in the Highlands of Scotland. With the renaissance of art in Italy, modelling in wax took a position of high importance, and it was practised by some of the greatest of the early masters. The bronze medallions of Pisano and the other famous medallists owe their value to the art qual ities of wax models from which they were cast by the cire perdue process ; and indeed all early bronzes and metal work were cast from wax models. The tete de cire in the \Vicar collection at Lille is one of the most lovely examples of artistic work in this medium in existence. Wicar, one of Napoleon's commissaries, brought this figure from Italy. It represents the head and shoul ders of a young girl. It has been claimed as a work of Greek or Roman art, and has been assigned to Leonardo da Vinci and to Raphael, but all that can be said is that it probably dates from the Italian Renaissance. In Spain beautiful wax figures of saints, distinguished in form and colouring, were achieved in the realm of religious art. Till towards the close of the i8th century model ling of medallion portraits and of relief groups, the latter fre quently polychromatic, was in considerable vogue throughout Europe. About the end of the i8th century Flaxman executed in wax many portraits and other relief figures which Josiah Wedg wood translated into pottery for his jasper ware. The modelling of the soft parts of dissections, etc., for teaching illustrations of anatomy was first practised at Florence, and is now very common. Such preparations formed part of a show at Hamburg in 1721, and from that time wax-works, on a plane lower than art, have been popular attractions. Such an exhibition of wax-works with mechanical motions was shown in Germany early in the i8th century, and is described by Steele in the Tatler. The most famous exhibition is that of Marie Tussaud (q.v.) in London.