POTTERIES AND PORCELAINS.
In architecture terra-cotta was ex tensively employed for roof tiles and other decorative details, as has been shown by discoveries made during research throughout Greece and the southern part of Italy, as well as in Asia Minor. In the Heraion at Olympia we have one of the oldest examples of a terra-cotta roof. A 7th-century temple at Thermon in Acarnania was constructed of wood and terra-cotta, with painted terra-cotta slabs in wooden frames for metopes. The generic term for a roof tile was 14payos, and these are classified as flat square tiles
or
and semi-cylindrical covering tiles (icaXtnrrlip€3). Other varieties of ornamental tiles used in buildings are (I) the covering slabs along the raking-cornice (-yficrov) of the pediment ; (2) the KvklartoP or cornice above the
(3) the cornice along the sides with lions' head spouts to carry off rain water; (4) the ecKpayriipta or antefixal ornaments surmount ing the side-tiles. They were usually enriched with decoration in colour, the KV,U6GT COP being painted with elaborate patterns of lotos-and-honeysuckle or maeander, in red, blue, brown and yel low. The antefixes were usually modelled in the form of palmettes, but were sometimes adorned with reliefs of heads or figures, for instance in the temples at Olympia, Thermon, Kalydon, Capua and Tarentum. Many coloured roof tiles have been found at Olympia.
Terra-cotta is rare in Greece for large statues. In Italy, and also in Cyprus it was a favourite mate rial. The difference is easily explained by the source of sup plies, Greece having abundant provision of marble, Italy hardly any, at least until the opening of the Carrara quarries. From the Minoan period we have interesting examples of glazed and painted terra-cotta statuettes from Knossos and Petsofa (see Plate II., fig. 3) in surprisingly modern-looking costumes. Mycenaean examples are of a more schematic character.
Classical Greek traditions on the subject go back to one Butades of Sikyon, a potter who was credited with the invention of mod elling clay in relief, and the Samian sculptors, Theodorus and Rhoikos, who lived about the end of the 7th century B.C. The
small terra-cotta figures used as ornaments or household gods, buried in tombs or dedicated in temples have been found in large numbers on nearly all the well-known sites of antiquity, the most fruitful being Tanagra in Boeotia; Myrina and Smyrna in Asia Minor; Rhodes, the Cyrenaica, Athens, Sicily and some of the towns of southern Italy. They are also found in Cyprus and Sar dinia, where, as to some extent in Rhodes, they follow a peculiar development, under the domination of Eastern influence. Many of the earlier types have a markedly oriental character. But in the Greek terra-cottas we may trace a steady development from the primitive types which correspond to the E6ava of primitive Greek religion, and for the most part represent actual deities, down to the purely genre figures of Tanagra and other Hellenistic prod ucts. For beauty and charm the palm has by general consent been given to the Tanagra figures of the 4th and 3rd centuries B.C. so called after the little Boeotian town of Tanagra where such statuettes were first found in tombs about 187o. They were known in antiquity as 6pm. or "Maidens," from the presence of seated or standing types of girls in various attitudes; and the makers of these figures were known as KoporX1Larat.
Greek terra-cotta statuettes, though oc casionally modelled and solid, are usually moulded and hollow. The process of manufacture was briefly as follows : A mould of clay was first made and baked to considerable hardness (Plate II., fig. 13). Its surface was then covered with layers of well levi gated, moist clay until the required thickness was reached. The shrinkage of the clay in drying allowed the figure to be easily removed from the mould. The back was made separately (either in another mould or, if summarily worked, by hand) with a vent hole for evaporation. To insure the desired diversity the head and arms were often moulded separately and different moulds variously combined. The many hundred Tanagra statuettes in spite of their obvious similarity include few duplicates.