‘It is a tempting suggestion that it was the engravers of such texts—that is, either the sculptors themselves or the engravers employed by them—who were the pioneers of the new style’ (see below, Notes I, II and IV). This passage in Austin's book encourages me to say that every study of the early stoichedon documents of Attica must begin with the dedication of Nearchos signed by Antenor (see Note III). When considered in connexion with all known examples of the period, this inscription assumes a significance which is not apparent when it is studied in connexion with the list which Austin has recorded (p. 7), intentionally incomplete as that list is (see Note IV). The ‘lamentably fragmentary state’ of the greater part of these private dedicatory inscriptions (Austin, p. 64) cannot deter us from a careful examination which leads, as a rule, to the reconstruction of the monuments as well as to reasonable restorations of the inscriptions.

The clear distinction between dedicatory inscription and artist's signature is no peculiarity of the monument signed by Antenor, though the fact that both inscriptions are stoichedon, with the stoichoi independent of one another, shows the fully developed stoichedon style, as does the disregard of the syllabic division (see Note V).

Some of the most magnificent representations of chariots in mid career are seen on the coins of Sicily and Southern Italy toward the close of the fifth century B.C. There are two major theories concerning the appearance of these striking compositions in Sicilian numismatic art. One theory is that dies for these coins are the independent products of local, native artists of highest competence. The other is that the dies for these pieces are the work of Attic artists who migrated to the prosperous cities of Sicily to take up new careers as workers in the minor metallic arts, as gem cutters, and as die sinkers for the various local rulers. We lack positive evidence. We cannot identify any artist who left Attica to pursue work of this type in Southern Italy or Sicily. Scholars have produced a mass of conjecture and speculation on this subject.

The treatment of space and depth in the chariot compositions seems to the writer to provide a new possibility for grouping and relating the representations of chariots in the late fifth century—both those on the major monuments in sculptured relief and those on the Tetradrachms and Dekadrachms of Syracuse and Akragas. From a restudy of the methods of relief representation and from a survey of information derived from such connecting links between major sculpture and coinage as silverware, gems, and vases further light may be thrown on the problems of the artistic derivation of the renowned die compositions of later fifth-century Sicily.

The treasures of modern art preserved in Chatsworth House are well known to writers on the history of art. But of the small and choice collection of works of ancient sculpture contained in this fine mansion, the property of the Duke of Devonshire, information has up to now been almost entirely lacking to archaeologists. I myself have to thank the Duke's librarian, Professor Arthur Strong, for calling my attention to it, and for the opportunity of inspecting the collection in the autumn of 1895.

A description of the most important work, the bronze head of Apollo, an original of about B.C. 460, appeared in my book, Intermezzi, kunstgeschichtliche Studien (Leipzig, 1896), Plates 1–4, pp. 3 f. An interesting Roman relief has been published by E. Petersen in the Römische Mittheilungen (1899), Plate 8, pp. 222 f. I have also written a short notice of the whole collection in the treatise Ueber Statuenkopieen im Alterthum, I. (1896), p. 26. That I am now in a position in this paper to enter into more minute details with the help of photographs I owe to the kindness of Prof. Arthur Strong, (who was good enough to supervise the taking of the photographs), as well as of the editors of this Journal, to all of whom I must express my warmest thanks.

The custom of dedicating or of specially setting apart articles of use or ornament to divine beings has been common to many peoples, and has come down from a remote antiquity to the present day. Nor is the motive which prompts the action one in any way foreign to the impulses by which men are moved. A danger escaped, a victory achieved, is not unnaturally believed to be due, at all events in some measure, to powers not of the lower world, who can control and even overrule the designs of mortal men. In the temples, therefore, of the gods, and in other places hallowed by the more immediate presence of the divinity, it has been the habit to offer various things in recognition of benefits already bestowed, or in the hope of favours to be granted in the future. The pot of manna and Aaron's rod which budded laid up in the Tabernacle, are as trite as are the models which the same pious feeling still deposits in Christian churches, in remembrance of shipwrecks escaped from or of diseases cured. In no country was the custom more observed than in Hellas, where it was usual to dedicate a tenth of the spoil taken in war, and where at the great shrines so large were the offerings, that many of the states had θησαυροί, in which were preserved the almost innumerable votive objects dedicated to the Gods. In Greece itself there was no place, not excepting Delphi and Dodona, where more evidence of the observance of the custom was to be found than at Olympia, and in the temple where dwelt the cloud-compelling wielder of the lightning, the mighty dispenser of victory, Zeus, the King of Gods and men.

In Vol. LXXV (1955) of the JHS I suggested that the determination of the angular diameters of the sun and the moon ascribed to Thales (Diog. Laertius I. 24) may have been obtained by angular measurement, not as is generally supposed by time-measurement. However, the question of the precise technical method that may have been employed was left open. To measure a very small angle with any degree of accuracy is obviously not easy; and a combination of actual measurement with calculation is probably necessary. In what follows I describe a method of measuring very small angles: whether this was the method employed in obtaining the result ascribed to Thales I do not know; all I can claim is that it presupposes neither mathematical knowledge nor mathematical techniques which could not have been at the disposal of an early Greek philosopher-mathematician.

The marble statue of a youthful male figure holding in his left hand a snake-encircled staff, which is reproduced in the accompanying plate, was found by Smith and Porcher at Cyrene, and is now in the collection of the British Museum. By its original discoverers this figure was named Aristaeus: an attribution which has been adopted, though with some hesitation, in the Museum Guide to the Graeco-Roman Sculptures. As, however, this attribution seems more than doubtful, it may be well to lay before the readers of the Hellenic Journal some additional remarks upon the subject, and to direct special attention to a statue which is not among those photographed in the History of Discoveries at Cyrene, and which has not, hitherto, been figured elsewhere.

The statue now to be described is four feet five and a half inches in height, and represents a young and beardless male figure standing facing. His right hand rests upon his hip, and under his left arm is a staff round which is coiled a serpent. The lower half of the body is wrapt in a himation, the end of which falls over the left shoulder, leaving the chest and the right arm uncovered. The hair is wavy and carefully composed, but does not fall lower than the neck: around the head is a plain band, above which has been some kind of crown or upright headdress: the top of the head has been worked flat. On the feet are sandals, and at the side of the left foot is a conical object which has been called a rude representation of the omphalos, but which is, in all probability, a mere support.

The Terra-cotta reliefs which form the subject of the present article have been for some years one of the minor attractions of the Acropolis Museum, and I am indebted for permission to publish them to the kindness of the Ephor General M. Cavvadias, and of the Ephors, MM. Staïs and Castriotis. The latter as superintendent of the Museum most obligingly put at my disposal all the information in his possession and afforded me every facility for photographing the tablets. No single tablet in the collection is perfect and of the 73 fragments which comprise it, the great majority came to light during the systematic excavations of the Acropolis which were carried on from 1885–1890; they were all found at some depth below the surface and as far as could be learnt, to the north, the east and the south-east of the Parthenon. The rest have been in the Museum since 1863; these were all found on or near the surface and it is possible that others were carried away by visitors and are now hidden in private collections. The publication of the Museum fragments may lead to their identification and the completion of some of the tablets whose design cannot at present be determined.