HISTORY. Knowledge of perspective in all its branches is comparatively modern.
Oriental art knew nothing of any branch. A glance at Egyptian and Assyrian relief- shows that the most elementary principles were ignored. Buildings and trees were laid flat on the ground or stood up in front view; the figures were placed one on top of the other instead of on different planes.
Greek art first studied and solved some of the mysteries of linear perspective, but it is doubtful that the Greeks ever got beyond the architectural form into the plastic and pictorial forms. This step was reserved for the more realistic art of the Alexandrian and especially the Roman age. The frescoes at Pompeii often exhibit an elaborate attempt to draw huildings in perspective with varying degrees of unsuccess.
Renaissance art, however, attacked almost im mediately the question of linear perspective in all its branches. Such men as the Pollainolo and Andrea del Castagno, Melozzo and Mantegna revelled in their ability to overcome its diffi culties. After playing with architectural de sign, with both normal and abnormal base lines, they played with the foreshortening of figures. From painting the use of linear perspective crept into sculpture. especially through Donatello.
During the fifteenth century aerial perspec tive appeared in the landscape backgrounds of the early Flemish painters, like the Van Eyeks, whose use of oil colors gave the necessary ele ment of depth, diffused luminosity. and soft ness. The highest development of aerial perspec tive, however, was accomplished mainly by the Venetians of the sixteenth century, like Paolo Veronese, and by Correggio.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Early treatises are Houdin, Bibliography. Early treatises are Houdin, La perspective (Paris, 1642) ; _Alberti, Deur liurcs sur la perspective (Nuremberg.. 1671). The subject is very fully treated in Ware, Modern Perspective (Boston. 18851. Consult also: Cloquet, :Von reau trait(' de perspective (Paris, 1823) ; Herdman, Curvilinear Perspective in Yature (London. n. d.) Seeber ger, Principien. der Perspective (7th ed., Munich, 1900) ; Checa, La perspective (Paris, 1900) ; La Gonrnerie, Trait, dc perspective lineuire (ib., ISUS) Pratt, Perspective, including the Pro jection of Shadows and Reflections (London, 1901) ; Conz. Lehrbuelt der Perspektive (2d ed., Stuttgart. 1902).