ARCHAIC PERIOD ( till B.C. 480). This period may be conveniently divided into two parts: (a) The era of the formation of types and schools, and (b) the period of developed archaism, from about B.C. 550 to B.C. 480.
Formative Period.—The earliest Doric temples and other monuments of Greek art do not belong much before the year B.C. 700, unless Professor Dtirpfeld is right in assigning the Hernum at Olympia to a date not far from B.C. 1000. The evidence here is very uncertain; but even if it is accepted,' the building stands alone. The ear liest sculptures in the round are probably not earlier than B.C. 650, though here any positive date is unattainable. All the evidence shows that the artists were not confined to any one part of Greece, but that a general activity devel oped throughout the Greek world, using much the same types, but treating them with certain differences. Much has already bgen accomplished in distinguishing the several local schools and identifying their products. Their characteristics, however, are so dependent on details that their discussion lies outside the scope of this article, and it will be more convenient to consider the works with reference to types rather than schools.
Statues may be male or female, draped or nude, standing or seated. An examination of the monuments shows that not all the possible variations were adopted by these early artists. The standing figure, if male, is usually nude; if female, draped; while the seated figures are generally clothed. The male standing figure bears a striking resemblance to the Egyptian statues in its pose, and the suggestion may have come from Egypt, with which the Greeks of the sev enth century carried on an active trade; but the Greek artist, even at first, is no mere copyist, but endeavors to embody in the traditional form his own observations. These so-called 'Apollo' statues stand firmly on both feet, with the left foot advanced and the arms close to the sides. Little by little we may observe greater freedom, the arms are worked free from the body, though the hands are still pressed to the thighs, and a greater care in modeling, which seeks to bring out the muscles and bones, is manifest. Later in the period the type is modified, as in such a figure as the Calf-Bearer of the Acropolis, where the position of the hands has been completely altered, and the artist is fast freeing himself from some of the established conventionalities.
The draped female statues are scarcely more, at first, than slabs of stone carved into a rude out line of the human form. The head and long locks of hair, the arms at the sides, and the two feet side by side just showing beneath the long robe, are the only details attempted. The body is clothed in a long garment, girded at the waist and hanging perfectly straight to the feet. Prob ably the ancient color indicated detail that has now disappeared. A good example is the native statue of Nicandra, at Delos. Later more care is used in the treatment of the drapery, and the style begins which is best represented in the sixth century by the Acropolis 'Maidens' (s6pat). The seated draped figures are best.represented by the figures from Branchidse in the British Museum. Draped in large mantles, whose stiff folds are barely indicated in low relief, their hands resting on their knees, they sit in their high-backed thrones, without life or dignity, though recalling in their pose some of the earlier Babylonian work. • While sculpture in the round is developing through modifications of stereotyped forms, a greater advance seems to have been made in re liefs, especially in those of an architectural char acter. These are typified by the metopes of the oldest temple of Selinus, in Sicily, which, in spite of their ugliness, at least show some freedom in design. Even more interesting, though no more beautiful, are the remains of pediments in `poros' stone found on the Acropolis. They are among the earliest specimens of Attic art, and show it even then possessing characteristics of its own. Among these is the heavy build of the figures, which appears also in the 'Calf-Bearer,' and seems to cling to the Athenian School through out the sixth century, if not longer. At the very end of this period a work survives which can at least be dated approximately—viz. the great Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, which was rebuilt during the reign of Crcesus (B.C. 560-46). The Ionic columns of this temple were adorned with sculptures in relief upon the lower drum, some of the fragments of which are now in the British Museum. They show an advanced technique, and give promise of high future development.