Scum-ruliE. When Layard, Botta, and Place made the first excavations in Assyria, it was the sculptures that excited the greatest amazement throughout the world. The colossal hulls and lions guarding the portals and the miles of scenes in low relief were unlike anything yet known in the history of art, and their interest was not merely artistic, since they furnished the most graphic information as to the life. cos tume, and history of the people. There are still gaps. A solitary female statue of the Fourteenth Century B.C. to hint that Babylonian Models were then supreme, for its counterpart. is found in earlier Babylonian terra-cottas and gems. But later works show that statuary was seldom produced, as the Assyrian artist never mastered its technique; the few remaining statues of kings—such as Asurnazirpal, Setumeherib. and Asurlainipal, or of divinities, like Nebo—when compared with the mass of relief-work, show that the heart of the Assyrian sculptor was not in this branch of his art. lie (lid not know how to model the figure under the drapery, nor hail he learned to treat drapery in folds, but only as a smooth sheath. The colossal man-headed bulls and lions are in reality not works in the round, but in relief, standing out from a central Hock. Where the Assyrian sculptor showed his plover was in the observation of Nature eye to eye, and his ability to reproduce his impressions with realism without descending to triviality. In the royal hunting-scenes this is particularly striking. The lion standing regally in the royal park gazing down at the reclining lioness; the lioness shot through the spine and dragging along her para lyzed hind-quarters; the mortally lion gnawing his paws; the of the wild-ass hunt, with the various stages of watchfulness, panic, and Hight, wounding and tearing down by hOunds; the hunting hounds themselves led in the leash—these and many imire variations on similar themes are studies from life such as no other art has given us. Only the needlessly fas tidious will carp at the amusingly primitive com position of some of these scenes, due to the entire absence of a knowledge of perspective. Each figure in itself is perfeet ; and when the artist confines himself to a simple frieze-like proces sion, as in the scenes of the return from the hunt with the dead animals, or the king in his chariot starting the game, his composition does not suffer even from this imperfection.
Up to the present no discoveries of relief sculptures have been made earlier than the time of Asurnazirpal in the early Ninth Century; hit the art of his time, so powerful and com plete, shows that pr(dtably even under the great Tiglathpileser in the Twelfth Century Assyrian sculpture must have freed itself from its Ionian swaddling-clothes. When this was hap pening, Babylonian sculpture, after a development of some 3000 yen rs, had fallen into absolute de cay, and such works as those of Meredneh-idinachi, lifeless and fussy, would have been incapable of inspiring a new- art. In het, the Assyrian sculp tor found quite a new manner. Instead of the soft contours and delicate gradations of early Babylonian art, the Assyrian technique was sharp and elear-eut, the outlines distinct, the details given with accuracy. In the figures, the muscles, features. and hair; in the drapery, the patterns; and in the armor, harness, chariots, and other accessories. all the details are given with crisp touch. Doubtless the softness of the lime stone that served as material helped the sculptor to realize his ideal. and to produce the immense quantity of contemporary annals in stone that amazes us. The realism was assisted by the use of color in figures, drapery, and accessories. The Assyrians in this polyehromy of sculpture, as well as in the successful use of the frieze in low- re lief, were the worth, predecessors of 1:reek aft. The sculptures themselves can he studied in Euro pean museums; there remain on Assyrian sites only the yet undiscovered works—probably nu merous. Beliefs from Asti rli a zi rpat's palace may be seen not only at the British Museum, mm hither the great bulk of them were taken, but also at the Oregorian Museum in the Vativan, at the Ilistorical Society in New York, etc. They illustrate the simple, epic stage of Assyrian sculpture, and are mostly colossal figures a• ranged in a single row- on• the marble dado that decorated the rooms and corridors I if the palaces.
figinvs are heavier and more strongly marked than later, and there are few or no accessories. What the of development was during the next one hundred and fifty years we can only sur mise, for the next large group of stone reliefs is that of the palace of Sargon at li.horsallad, now in the Louvre, which shows the last stage of this epic style; it is still colossal and simple, but while the guardian lion of Asurnazirpal snarls and strikes terror, the nmn-headed bulls of Sar gon are genteel colossi of colorless mien. The processions, also, have lost the early fire. The time was ripe for a change of style, which ap peared under Sargon's sneeessor, Sommeherih, whose reliefs show the advent of a novel pic turesqueness. Figures are multiplied on a back ground often 11111 of accessories, of landscape, and of buildings; in place of the majestic frieze of large personages, small figures are scattered every where. it is true that more respect is shown to art by not allowing the reseriptive inscriptions which accompanied the reliefs to 1,e run straight across the figures, as hitherto; but the defects consequent on ignorance of perspective are made far more conspicuous. This introduction of the pictorial element, in order to infuse new life into the art, seems to have been successful; for the art of the succeeding generation—that of Asur banipal, whose sculptures form the most fascinat ing group ill the British Museum—shows the good qualities of both the old and the new schools. Then- is a riot of litany figures in the battle-scenes of the Elamite War; there is the quiet simplieity of the antique frieze in many hunting and banquet scenes. If we miss the greater force of the time of Asurnazirpal, there is an added delicacy.
The subjects of the reliefs fall into several categories. ( 1) and mythological scenes were rare and belonged mostly to the temples, which have not yet been as fully explored as the palaces: there were statues of the gods and heroes, and reliefs of the conflict of Merodaeh with the dragon, the labors of C:ilgamesh, and the wars of the evil spirits. (31 Scenes of con temporary history were pa rtieularly numerous. There were eourt sculptors who were as nmell the king's historiographers as were the writers. Every incident in a long war was portrayed in a fashion similar to that of the later artists in such works as the columns of Trojan and :Marcus Aurelius. la such scenes as the battle of Susa, which completed Asurbanipars conquest of Elam, each successive incident of the battle, even each separate phase of the duel of the two leading warriors, is given separately and side by side. It is a sort of moving panorama, which proceeds par( passe. with the descriptive text. The As syrian official annals of each yearly campaign are thins illustrated at every point. We see exactly how the Assyrian soldiers were armed and fought, marched, encamped, crossed rivers, at tacked cities, slaughtered and tortured enemies, cooked, and sacrificed to the gods. (3) Scenes of daily peaceful life are only less numerous. The king banqueting with his queen in the palace garden, or hunting lions, gazelles, or wild asses; the construction of a royal palace: the royal horses led to the river to be watered: incidents of court life and glimpses of the royal parks, all show the versatility of the artist. It is. however, true that far less use is mode of such material than was the case in Egypt, where many more de tails of manners and customs are portrayed. The Assyrian artist cared more for the official acts of his sovereign than for the life of the people or for the mysteries of religion. Consult the bibliography given in the preceding article.
AST, list GEORG ANTON FRIEDRICH (1778 IS41). A German philologist and philosopher. He became professor of classical literature at Landshut (18051 and at Munich (1826). Among his works were a Handburh der Arstlictik (1805), Grundriss der Geschiehte der Philosophic Darstellung der Gram mati•, Hermcneutik 1111(1 Kritik (180S) Phitos Leber Sehriften (1810), and an edition of Plato in eleven volumes with Latin translation and extensive notes.