EARLY CHRISTIAN AND BYZANTINE SCULPTURE.
The beginnings of Christian Sculpture are so interwoven with the art of the Roman empire that from an artistic standpoint it is difficult to mark the dividing-line. In the colossal equestrian statues of marble or of bronze which each emperor erected for his glorification there is little to choose between the pagan Claudius or Julian and the Christian Theodosius: where the subject was the same we can discover no difference in the artistic treatment of contemporary works. Where the contrast appears most striking is between the mythological subjects on the one hand and the religious themes of Christian art on the other. A total change of spirit shines forth in the representations of the new faith—a spirit which so transforms the art as to lead it gradually into higher regions until it becomes a worthy representative of regenerated human ity. But sculpture was not the chosen vehicle of early Christian art, which gravitated more and more to the sister-art of painting. In classic times sculpture was the favorite art, and was thus most intimately con nected with the idolatrous worship of false divinities. From the begin ning this must have created among those early Christians who were bat tling for their faith an aversion to an art which was devoted to the service of the enemy. Although this led to the more extensive use of painting, yet sculpture was not quite neglected, especially when, under Constantine and his successors, the whole empire was covered with magnificent churches.
Statues of SS. Peter and of metal were most employed, and the basilicas of the fourth and fifth centuries were filled with silver and bronze figures of Christ and the apostles, of John the Baptist and the Virgin. These works were probably executed by artists who still preserved the traditions of classic art, with its beauty and per fection of form. How unfortunate it is that, with a single exception, none of these works have been preserved! But this exception is suffi cient to prove the general excellence. It is a colossal bronze statue of
St. Peter (p1. fig. r), which remains to the present day at Rome in the great basilica dedicated to this apostle. Its style is so classic that it 59 has been conjectured to be a statue of Jupiter changed into one of the apostle by the addition, in his left hand, of the keys of heaven and hell— a well-known attribute of St. Peter—and by the change of position of the right arm into the attitude of benediction. There cannot, however, be any doubt that it is a work of Christian sculpture, probably of the fifth century. It is evidently a portrait-statue as far as the artist could make it one 1w adhering to the traditional type of the apostle, which had been perpetuated already for nearly three centuries in small bronzes and paint ings on glass. The head, with its heavy but regular features and curly hair, is \yell poised on the thick-set and muscular body. This statue of St. Peter and the beautiful, and even earlier, marble statue of St. Hip polytus of Porto are the most remarkable examples remaining of this period. (p1.
Sham-tic The Good charming specimen of earlier Christian statuary dating from the second or third century, when the faithful were still confined to the catacombs, is the marble statuette of Christ as the Good Shepherd, tenderly bearing across his shoulders the lost lamb; this statuette is now in the Lateran Museum, in Rome; the outline in Figure 3 (p1. 17) gives but an inadequate idea of the slender, light, and graceful figure, whose youthful face is full of tenderness. It is but one way in which Christ was represented in this early art; it was always in an impersonal manner, for a conventional type of Christ was created only several centuries later. During these early centuries (second to sixth) Christ was symbolized either by inanimate objects like the anchor, the alpha and omega, the pax, or by types taken either from classic legends, like Orpheus charming the animal creation with his lyre, or from the New Testament, like the Good Shepherd.