Museum of Antiquity Part 18

The quant.i.ty of the precious metals, formerly used for the purposes of luxury, greatly diminished after the decline of the Roman empire, and in the middle ages they were sparingly employed except for coinage; ornamental work in gold and silver, mostly executed by first-rate artists, being confined to men of rank, till the opening of new mines added to the supply; which was afterwards increased by the abundant treasures of America; and the quant.i.ty applied to ornamental purposes then began to vie with that of olden times.

M. Leon Faucher even calculates the annual abstraction of the precious metals from circulation by use for luxury, disasters at sea, and export, at 25 million dollars, in Europe and the United States.

The silver from the American mines exported to Europe in 100 years, to 1630, gave an addition to the currency of 5 million dollars annually, besides that used for other purposes, or re-exported; and from 1630 to 1830 from 7-1/2 to 10 millions annually; an increase in the quant.i.ty used for currency having taken place, as well as in that exported to India, and employed for purposes of luxury.

Humboldt states the whole quant.i.ty of gold from the American mines, up to 1803, to be 162 millions of pounds in weight, and of silver 7,178 millions, or 44 of silver to 1 of gold.

Again, the total value of gold produced during three centuries to 1848, including that from Russia, has been estimated at $2,825,000,000; and the total annual quant.i.ty of gold, before the discovery of the Californian fields, has been reckoned at about $50,000,000. That from California and Australia already amounts yearly to $170,000,000 (or 3-2/5 times as much as previously obtained), and is still increasing; but though far beyond the supply afforded by the discovery of America, the demand made upon it by the modern industry of man, together with the effect of rapid communication, and of the extension of trade, as well as by the great deficiency of gold in the world, will prevent its action being felt in the same way as when the American supply was first obtained; and still less will be the effect now, than it would have been in ancient times, if so large and sudden a discovery had then been made. For, as Chevalier says, "Vast as is the whole amount of gold in the world, it sinks into insignificance when contrasted with the aggregate product of other branches of human industry. If they increase as fast as the gold, little or no alteration will take place in its value; which depends on the relation between it and the annual production of other wealth."

According to another calculation, all the gold now in the world is supposed to be equal to about $3,410,000,000; but the whole amount of either of the two precious metals in old times is not easily ascertained, nor can any definite comparison be established between their former and present value. And still less in Egypt, than in Greece and Rome, no standard of calculation being obtainable from the prices of commodities there, or from any other means of determining, the value of gold and silver.

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FOOTNOTES:

[21] At this meal, contrary to the usual custom, women were present.

[22] According to tradition, many Makedonians were killed by the Persians taking hold of their long beards, and pulling them to the ground. Alexander, in consequence, had his troops shaved during the battle.

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DOMESTIC UTENSILS.

The immense number and variety of statues, lamps, urns, articles of domestic use, in metal or earthenware, etc., discovered at Herculaneum and Pompeii, have rendered the Museum at Naples an inexhaustible treasury of information relative to the private life of the ancients.

To give an adequate description of the richness and variety of its contents would far exceed the whole extent of this work, much more the small s.p.a.ce which it can have; but that s.p.a.ce can not be better occupied than in describing some few articles which possess an interest from the ingenuity of their construction, the beauty of their workmanship, or their power to ill.u.s.trate ancient usages or ancient authors.

Writing implements are among the most important of the latter cla.s.s, on account of the constant mention of them, as well as of the influence which the comparative ease or difficulty of producing copies of writing is always found to exert over society. On this head there is no want of information. The implements used are frequently mentioned, especially in familiar writings, as the letters of Cicero, and their forms have been tolerably ascertained from various fragments of ancient paintings.

It is hardly necessary to state that for ma.n.u.scripts of any length, and such as were meant to be preserved, parchment or vellum, and a vegetable tissue manufactured from the rush _papyrus_, were in use.

The stalk of this plant consists of a number of thin concentric coats, which, being carefully detached, were pasted crossways one over the other, like the warp and woof in woven manufactures, so that the fibres ran longitudinally in each direction, and opposed in each an equal resistance to violence. The surface was then polished with a sh.e.l.l, or some hard smooth substance. The ink used was a simple black liquid, containing no mordant to give it durability, so that the writing was easily effaced by the application of a sponge. The length of the Greek papyri is said to vary from eight to twelve inches; the Latin often reach sixteen; the writing is in columns, placed at right angles to the length of the roll.

To each of them is appended a sort of ticket, which served as a t.i.tle.

Hence the end of the roll, or volume, was called _frons_, a term of frequent recurrence in Ovid and Martial, and not always rightly understood. Hence, also, when we meet with the expression, _gemina frons_, we must understand that the volume had a ticket at each end.

These books were also composed of two tables or pages, and served for memoranda, letters, and other writings, not intended to be preserved.

They were composed of leaves of wood or metal coated over with wax, upon which the ancients wrote with a _stylus_, or iron pen, or point rather, for it was a solid sharp-pointed instrument, some 6 to 8 inches in length, like a lady's stiletto upon a large scale. In the middle of each leaf there appears to have been a b.u.t.ton, called _umbilicus_, intended to prevent the pages touching when closed, and obliterating the letters traced on the yielding wax.

The tablets here represented would be called twofold, as consisting only of two leaves; in the following cut may be seen another sort, consisting of several leaves, united at the back with hinges or rings.

In Latin they were called _tabulae_, or _tabellae_, and the epithets, duplices, triplices, quintuplices, served to mark the number of the leaves.

Beside them stands a double inkstand, intended probably to contain both black and red ink. The former was made either of lampblack or some other sort of charcoal, or from the cuttlefish, and was called atramentum. As it contained no mordant, and was readily obliterated by moisture, it could be used for writing upon ivory tablets; and it has been conjectured that some sorts of paper were covered with a wash, or varnish, to facilitate the discharge of the old writing, and render the paper serviceable a second time. Red ink was prepared from cinnabar. The reed, cut to a point, which lies beside the inkstand, is the instrument used in writing with ink before the application of quills. It was called _calamus_. The open papyrus explains how ma.n.u.scripts were read, rolled up at each end, so as to show only the column of writing upon which the student was intent. At the other side is a purse, or bag, to hold the reed, penknife, and other writing instruments.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TABULae, CALAMUS, AND PAPYRUS.]

The next cut represents, besides a set of tablets bound up, a single one hanging from a nail. Such, probably, were those suspended at Epidaurus, containing remedies by which the sick had been cured, by the perusal of which Hippocrates is said to have profited in the compilation of his medical works. It also contains, besides a papyrus similar to those described, a hexagonal inkstand, with a ring to pa.s.s the finger through, upon which there lies an instrument resembling a reed, but the absence of the knots, or joints, marks it to be a stylus. Another of these instruments leans against the open book.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TABULae, STYLUS, AND PAPYRUS.]

These were made of every sort of material; sometimes with the precious metals, but usually of iron, and on occasion might be turned into formidable weapons. It was with his stylus that Caesar stabbed Casca in the arm, when attacked in the senate by his murderers; and Caligula employed some person to put to death a senator with the same instruments.

In the reign of Claudius women and boys were searched to ascertain whether there were styluses in their pen-cases. Stabbing with the pen, therefore, is not merely a metaphorical expression. Tablets such as those here represented, were the day-books, or account-books. When they were full, or when the writing on them was no longer useful, the wax was smoothed, and they were ready again for other service.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TABULae AND INK STAND.]

The cut above, besides an inkstand, represents an open book. The thinness and yellowish color of the leaves, which are tied together with ribbon, denotes that it was made of parchment or vellum.

[Ill.u.s.tration: LIBRARIES AND MONEY.]

Below is a cylindrical box, called _scrinium_ and _capsa_, or _capsula_, in which the ma.n.u.scripts were placed vertically, the t.i.tles at the top. Catullus excuses himself to Manlius for not having sent him the required verses, because he had with him only one box of his books. It is evident that a great number of volumes might be comprised in this way within a small s.p.a.ce; and this may tend to explain the smallness of the ancient libraries--at least of the rooms which are considered to have been such. Beside the box are two tablets, which, from the money-bag and coins scattered about, had probably been used in reckoning accounts.

No perfect papyri, but only fragments, have been found at Pompeii. At Herculaneum, up to the year 1825, 1,756 had been obtained, besides many others destroyed by the workmen, who imagined them to be mere sticks of charcoal. Most of them were found in a suburban villa, in a room of small dimensions, ranged in presses round the sides of the room, in the centre of which stood a sort of rectangular book-case.

Sir Humphry Davy, after investigating their chemical nature, arrived at the conclusion that they had not been carbonized by heat, but changed by the long action of air and moisture; and he visited Naples in hopes of rendering the resources of chemistry available towards deciphering these long-lost literary treasures. His expectations, however, were not fully crowned with success, although the partial efficacy of his methods was established; and he relinquished the pursuit at the end of six months, partly from disappointment, partly from a belief that vexatious obstacles were thrown in his way by the jealousy of the persons to whom the task of unrolling had been intrusted. About five hundred volumes have been well and neatly unrolled. It is rather remarkable that, as far as we are acquainted, no ma.n.u.script of any known standard work has been found, nor, indeed, any production of any of the great luminaries of the ancient world.

The most celebrated person, of whom any work has been found, is Epicurus, whose treatise, _De Natura_, has been successfully unrolled.

This and a few other treatises have been published. The library in which this was found appears to have been rich in treatises on the Epicurean philosophy. The only Latin work which it contained was a poem, attributed to Rabirius, on the war of Caesar and Antony.

A curious literary monument has been found in the shape of a calendar. It is cut on a square block of marble, upon each side of which three months are registered in perpendicular columns, each headed by the proper sign of the zodiac. The information given may be cla.s.sed under three heads, astronomical, agricultural, and religious.

The first begins with the name of the month; then follows the number of days; then the nones, which in eight months of the year fall on the fifth day, and were thence called quintanae--in the others on the seventh, and were, therefore, called septimanae. The ides are not mentioned, because seven days always elapsed between them and the nones. The number of hours in the day and night is also given, the integral part being given by the usual numerals, the fractional by an S for semissis, the half, and by small horizontal lines for the quarters. Lastly, the sign of the zodiac in which the sun is to be found is named, and the days of the equinoxes and of the summer solstice are determined; for the winter solstice we read, _Hiemis initium_, the beginning of winter. Next the calendar proceeds to the agricultural portion, in which the farmer is reminded of the princ.i.p.al operations which are to be done within the month. It concludes with the religious part, in which, besides indicating the G.o.d under whose guardianship the month is placed, it notes the religious festivals which fall within it, and warns the cultivator against neglecting the worship of those deities upon whose favor and protection the success of his labors is supposed mainly to depend.

[Ill.u.s.tration: GOLD LAMP. (_Found at Pompeii._)]

No articles of ancient manufacture are more common than lamps. They are found in every variety of form and size, in clay and in metal, from the cheapest to the most costly description. A large and handsome gold lamp found at Pompeii in 1863 may be seen in the Pompeian room at the museum in Naples. We have the testimony of the celebrated antiquary, Winkleman, to the interest of this subject. "I place among the most curious utensils found at Herculaneum, the lamps, in which the ancients sought to display elegance and even magnificence. Lamps of every sort will be found in the museum at Portici, both in clay and bronze, but especially the latter; and as the ornaments of the ancients have generally some reference to some particular things, we often meet with rather remarkable subjects. A considerable number of these articles will be found in the British Museum, but they are chiefly of the commoner sort. All the works, however, descriptive of Herculaneum and Pompeii, present us with specimens of the richer and more remarkable cla.s.s which attract admiration both by the beauty of the workmanship and the whimsical variety of their designs. We may enumerate a few which occur in a work now before us, 'Antiquites d'Herculanum,' in which we find a Silenus, with the usual peculiarities of figure ascribed to the jolly G.o.d rather exaggerated, and an owl sitting on his head between two huge horns, which support stands for lamps. Another represents a flower-stalk growing out of a circular plinth, with snail-sh.e.l.ls hanging from it by small chains, which held the oil and wick; the trunk of a tree, with lamps suspended from the branches; another, a naked boy, beautifully wrought, with a lamp hanging from one hand, and an instrument for tr.i.m.m.i.n.g it from the other, the lamp itself representing a theatrical mask. Beside him is a twisted column surmounted by the head of a Faun or Baccha.n.a.l, which has a lid in its crown, and seems intended as a reservoir of oil. The boy and pillar are both placed on a square plateau raised upon lions'

claws. But beautiful as these lamps are, the light which they gave must have been weak and unsteady, and little superior to that of the old-fashioned common lamps, with which they are identical in principle. The wick was merely a few twisted threads drawn through a hole in the upper surface of the oil vessel, and there was no gla.s.s to steady the light and prevent its varying with every breeze that blew.

"Still, though the Romans had not advanced so far in art as to apply gla.s.s chimneys and hollow circular wicks to their lamps, they had experienced the inconvenience of going home at night through a city poorly paved, watched and lighted, and accordingly soon invented lanterns to meet the want. These, we learn from Martial, who has several epigrams upon this subject, were made of horn or bladder: no mention, we believe, occurs of gla.s.s being thus employed. The rich were preceded by a slave bearing their lantern. This Cicero mentions as being the habit of Catiline upon his midnight expeditions; and when M. Antony was accused of a disgraceful intrigue, his lantern-bearer was tortured to extort a confession whither he had conducted his master. One of these machines, of considerable ingenuity and beauty of workmanship, was found in Herculaneum, and another almost exactly the same, at Pompeii a few years after. In form it is cylindrical, with a hemispherical top, and it is made of sheet-copper, except the two main pieces, which are cast. The bottom consists of a flat, circular copper plate, supported by three b.a.l.l.s, and turned up all around the rim, from which rise the rectangular supports, which support the upper part of the frame. The top and bottom were further connected by the interior uprights, between which the laminae of horn or gla.s.s were placed, and secured at the top and bottom by the doublings of the copper. Horn was the most common substance used to transmit the light, but bladder and other membranes were also employed. In the centre of the lantern is seen the small lamp. The cover is hemispherical, and lifts up and down: it is pierced with holes for the admission of air, and has besides the characters NBVRTI-CATIS p.r.i.c.ked upon it. These have been interpreted, Tiburti Cati Sum, or Tiburti Cati S. (ervus), indicating, the one that it belonged to Catus, or that it was to be carried by his slave."

[Ill.u.s.tration: CANDELABRUM, OR LAMP STAND.]

One of the most elegant articles of furniture in ancient use was the candelabrum, by which we mean those tall and slender stands which served to support a lamp, but were independent of, and unconnected with, it. These, in their original and simple form, were mere reeds or straight sticks, fixed upon a foot by peasants to raise their light to a convenient height; at least such a theory of their origin is agreeable to what we are told of the rustic manners of the early Romans, and it is in some degree countenanced by the fashion in which many of the ancient candelabra are made. Sometimes the stem is represented as throwing out buds; sometimes it is a stick, the side branches of which have been roughly lopped, leaving projections where they grew; sometimes it is in the likeness of a reed or cane, the stalk being divided into joints. Most of those which have been found in the buried cities are of bronze, some few of iron. In their general plan and appearance there is a great resemblance, though the details of the ornaments admit of infinite variety. All stand on three feet, usually griffins' or lions' claws, which support a light shaft, plain or fluted according to the fancy of the maker. The whole supports either a plinth large enough for a lamp to stand on, or a socket to receive a wax candle, which the Romans used sometimes instead of oil in lighting their rooms. Some of them have a sliding shaft, like that of a music stand, by which the light might be raised or lowered at pleasure.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CANDELABRA, OR LAMP STANDS.]

One of those elegant table lamps, by the praise of which the present discussion was introduced, is represented in the accompanying plate.

Including the stand it is three feet high. On a rectangular plinth rises a rectangular pillar, crowned by a capricious capital. On the front of the pillar is a mask of a Bacchante, with fine features and long flowing hair; and on the opposite side, the head of a bull, with the Greek word Bucranion. From the extreme points of the abacus, four ornamental branches, beautifully chased, project; the lamps which now hang from them, though ancient, also, are not those which belong to the stand, and were not found with it. They are nearly alike in figure, but differ in size. Three of them are ornamented with various animals, the fourth is plain. One of them has each of its ends wrought into the form of a sh.e.l.l. Above are two eagles in high relief, with the thunderbolt of Jupiter in their talons. Another has two bulls'

heads, a third two elephants' heads projecting from the sides. The latter is suspended by two dolphins, instead of the chains generally in use, whose tails are united, and attached to a small ball and ring.

The pillar is not placed in the center, but at one end of the plinth, which is the case in almost every lamp of this description yet found.

The s.p.a.ce thus obtained may have served as a stand for the oil vase used in tr.i.m.m.i.n.g the lamps. The plinth is beautifully damasked, or inlaid, in imitation of a vine, the leaves of which are of silver, the stem and fruit of bright bra.s.s. On one side is an altar with wood and fire upon it; on the other a Bacchus, naked, with his thick hair plaited and bound with ivy. He rides a tiger, and has his left hand in the att.i.tude of holding reins, which time probably has destroyed; with the right he raises a drinking-horn. The workmanship of this lamp is exquisitely delicate in all its parts.

Before we quit this subject we have still one candelabrum to notice, which for simplicity of design and delicacy of execution is hardly to be surpa.s.sed by any in the Neapolitan collection. The stem is formed of a liliaceous plant, divided into two branches, each of which supports a flat disc, which may represent the flower, upon which a lamp was placed. At the base is a ma.s.s of bronze which gives stability to the whole, upon which a Silenus is seated, earnestly engaged in trying to pour wine from a skin which he holds in his left hand into a cup in his right. In this figure all the distinctive marks of the companion and tutor of Bacchus are expressed with great skill; the pointed ears, the goat's tail, the s.h.a.ggy skin, the flat nose, and the ample rotundity of body, leave no doubt on our minds as to the person intended to be represented. The head, especially, is admirable, both in respect of workmanship and expression.

Amongst Greek domestic utensils we also count articles made of basket-work, which frequently occur in antique pictures. The kalathos, the basket for keeping wool (used for weaving and embroidering), and also flowers and fruit, is frequently met with in vase paintings ill.u.s.trating the life of Greek women. As early as Homer's time baskets, probably round or oval, were used at meals, to keep bread and pastry in. They had a low rim and handles. The kaneon was also used at offerings, where it is filled with pomegranates, holly boughs and ribbons. At the Panathenaia n.o.ble Athenian maidens carried such baskets, filled with holy cakes, incense, and knives on their heads. These graceful figures were a favorite subject of antique sculpture. Both Polyklete and Skopas had done a celebrated kaneph.o.r.e--the former in bronze, the latter in marble. There was also a flat basket, chiefly used for carrying fish, similar to that used at the present day by fishermen in the south. Other baskets used by peasants appear frequently in antique pictures, in the original carried by a peasant on a stick over his shoulder, together with another basket of the same pear-like shape, taken from a bas-relief representing a vintage, in which the former appears filled with grapes, while the latter is being filled with must by a boy. This proves, at the same time, the knowledge amongst the Greeks of the art of making the basket-work dense enough to hold fluids. The same fact is shown by a pa.s.sage in Homer, in which Polyphemos lets the milk coagulate to cheese in baskets, which cheese was afterwards placed on a hurdle through which the whey trickled slowly. Of plaited rushes, or twigs, consisted also a peculiar kind of net, a specimen of which is seen on the reverse of a medal coined under the Emperor Macrinus, as the emblem of the maritime city of Byzantium.

To light and heat the room, in Homer's time, fire-baskets, or fire-basins were used, standing on high poles, and fed with dry logs of wood or splinters. The cinders were, at intervals, removed by serving-maids, and the flames replenished. Such fire-baskets on poles are still used by night-travelers in Southern Russia, and at nightly ceremonies in India. The use of pine-torches is of equal antiquity.

They consisted of long, thin sticks of pine-wood, tied together with bark, rushes or papyrus. The bark of the vine was also used for torches, called lophis. The golden statues on pedestals, in the hall of Alkinoos, undoubtedly held such torches in their hands. In vase paintings we also see a different form of the torch, carried chiefly by Demeter and Persephone, which consists of two pieces of wood fastened crosswise to a staff. An imitation of this wooden torch was undoubtedly the torch-case made of clay or metal in the shape of a salpinx. Its surface was either smooth or formed in imitation of the bundles of sticks and the bark of the wooden torch, the inside being filled with resinous substances.