Roman typeface

“ The Roman presents an abundance of dark shadows which, in turn, create an effect of heaviness and density. The Greek puts in just enough of them to quicken the general coloring. The Roman gives a flatter effect, which shows nevertheless a magnificent vigor. As for us, we copy these styles endlessly without understanding them, for if we did understand them we should do quite otherwise. We abuse the black, the powerful lines, we put them everywhere; we do not know how to shade light. That is why our sculpture is so poor, why our monuments appear so hard, so dry. ”

“ The more fiery Roman gives you glowing sketches, not pictures—they flow from him with that careless haste so indicative of boundless wealth. Each sketch bears within itself the evidence of lofty conception, and shows in every line the traces of a master's hand whose rapid touch is too busy in embodying the forms with which his brain is teeming to waste its energies in those minuter cares so necessary for filling out a perfect picture. ”

“ When centuries of great plundering barons have impressed on a race the haughty and rapacious profile of a bird of prey, the metal may change, but the imprint remains the same. Many of the faces that seemed the most pronouncedly Italian, with a Luini smile, or the voluptuous, calm gaze of a Titian, flowers of the Adriatic, or the plains of Lombardy, had blossomed on the shrubs of the North transplanted to the old Latin soil. Whatever colors be spread on the palette of Rome, the color which stands out is always Roman. ”

“ The characters of the heads always bear out the descriptions which historians have given of the person they belong to, the Roman head differing essentially from the Greek, in having a more arched forehead, a nose more aquiline, and features altogether of a more decided character. It may be observed, however, as a general remark, that the Roman statues are of a thicker and more robust form, with less ease and grace, more stern, and of a less ideal expression than Greek statues, though equally made by Greek artists. ”

“ On the one side, with ear close to the grate, is a round, smoothly developed Italian head, with that rather tumid outline of features which one often sees in a Roman in middle life, when easy living and habits of sensual indulgence begin to reveal their signs in the countenance, and to broaden and confuse the clear-cut, statuesque lines of early youth. ”

“ They speak too eloquently for themselves. Not there do we see the mere realism of Rome, the careful and often too careful arrangement that Roman art, able to speak but incapable of song, always gives us. Here we have something at once more gorgeous and more mysterious and more artistic, a symbolical and hieratic art, the gift of the Orient, of Byzantium. In the best Roman art of the best period there is always something of the street, something too close to life, too mere a transcription and a copy of actual things, a mere imitation without life of its own. ”

“ The ruined Roman sits among the ruins; he flies to no green garden; he does not look to heaven; if his intent is defeated, if he is less than he meant to be, he lives no more. The names which end in “us,” seem to speak with lyric cadence. That measured cadence, — that tramp and march, — which are not stilted, because they indicate real force, yet which seem so when compared with any other language, — make Latin a study in itself of mighty influence. The language alone, without the literature, would give one the thought of Rome. ”

“ Sometimes the Romans raised fabrics so strong that they resisted the shock of earthquakes; at others they took pleasure in devoting immense labour to buildings which they themselves destroyed as soon as their feasts were over; thus they sported with time in every shape. Besides, the Romans were not like the Greeks—influenced by a passion for dramatic representations. It was by Grecian work, and Grecian artists, that the fine arts flourished at Rome, and Roman greatness expressed itself rather by the colossal magnificence of architecture than by the masterpieces of the imagination. ”

“ It is no wonder that Horace was fond of strolling in Rome.
In contrast, the great and wonderful things of the Augustan city stand out in high relief, above the varied crowd that fills the streets, with all the dignity that centuries of power can lend. To the tawdry is opposed the splendid, the Roman general in his chiselled corselet and dyed mantle faces the Greek actor in his tinsel; the band of painted, half-clad, bedizened dancing-girls falls back cowering in awestruck silence as the noble Vestal passes by, high-browed, white-robed, untainted, the incarnation of purity in an age of vice. ”

“ If art is the outgrowth of the intellectual and moral condition of a people, what kind of art could the Romans have produced? None. And this was the case. Roman art is altogether a misnomer; it is in fact Etruskan, Greek, Assyrian, and Egyptian art, dressed in an eclectic Roman garb by foreign artists. Art with the Romans was never the glorious emanation of the poet’s sacred ideal of the gods, or the irresistible civilising power of beauty ”

“ Soon there dwelt in Rome as many statues as men; and the treasures disinterred in modern times at Tibur and Tusculum, on the Alban Mount, at Antium, and elsewhere in the neighborhood of the original seat of power, indicate that the surrounding region was not less rich than the capital itself. But a profound sense of art was never created at Rome, and, notwithstanding all the variety of excellence they brought together from afar, not one distinguished Roman artist lives on the record of fame. ”

“ Just as the inflectional language of Rome would not have expressed a quarter of what the agile-minded Greek desired to say, so the methods of the Roman portrait sculptor would have been valueless to the Greek to whom philosophical aperçus into the whole of human experience alone seemed worthy of incarnation in marble and bronze. ”

“ The crudeness of colour and asperity of tone observable in the Roman School, though founded on simplicity, is perhaps a greater proof of their want of eye and taste than of a pure historic principle. Harmony of colour consists in the due balance of all, equally remote [358] from monotony and from spots. Though each part of Roman pictures be painted with sufficient breadth of manner, their discordance is such that they do not coalesce into one whole, but appear unconnected fragments in apposition. ”

“ For the purpose of illumination, Roman lettering is not by any means ideal. It is much better to select a true pen-formed alphabet; but for modern usage, such as the various branches of commercial work, Roman lettering is used a great deal. It possesses one very great advantage, that is, its legibility. As the man in the street has his daily newspaper printed in a form of Roman lettering, he is therefore more familiar with this type than any other. ”

“ This ‘mania,’ or fashion, became so universal with the Romans that they could find no more works of classic art, and had to engage living artists to reproduce antique cornices, metopes, colonnades, capitals, shields, helmets, tripods, sphinxes, and griffins; but even these artists were so overwhelmed with commissions, that it was impossible for them to satisfy the feverish demand. To produce works of art more quickly, they began to paint the panels, and the Roman empire became a complete manufactory of wall-decorations. ”

“ Other Italian printers had founts both of Gothic and of Roman types. The great Venetian printer Jenson, for instance, and many of his fellows printed books in both characters; but the Roman gradually prevailed, first in Italy, then in Spain and France, and later on in England. In Germany, on the other hand, the cradleland of the craft, Gothic letter of a sadly debased type has held its own down to this day. Even in Germany, however, the use of Roman type has gained ground of late years, nationalist feeling notwithstanding. ”

“ It is true that we miss the philosophical calm with which a Greek sculptor would have treated such a subject as the imperial jurist Nerva. But, in some ways we must admit that the Roman portraitist is to be rated higher. If the impression that one is gazing upon reality is the proper object of the portrait sculptor, the Roman gives us the more life-like picture. But if the artist’s first function is to show us [Pg 136] nature, so that we may form our own judgment as to what is essential and organic by the aid of his insight, then the Greek who carved the very soul of men was the truer artist. ”

“ And the Romans—the true Romans—of the Regola and the Popolo, of the Monti district and the Trevi district, who add the adjective Roman to their name like a title of nobility, who eat dumplings on Thursdays, tripe on Sundays, and lamb at all times, who like white wine and the fireworks at Sant' Angelo, who are proud of their March water, and calmly allow the beetles to swarm in their old houses, the sceptical, clever, impassive, and industrious Romans, who are good husbands and kind lovers, they certainly are not asleep. ”

“ What is thus true of portrait sculpture is true of all Roman art. Its decline kept step with the decline of the nation, and both fell at length into a pitiable state of feebleness and corruption. From this we are glad to turn to the study of Christian art, which, even in its primary struggles, when groping its way through ignorance and helplessness, was still a living thing, and held the promise of a new life—a renaissance of that which had gradually died in Greece and Rome. ”

“ The portrait busts of the Romans were their highest achievements in art. One sees literally thousands of them in Italy, and their painstaking accuracy is obvious. What is to me most interesting is that the sculptured Roman head and face might easily be taken for a portrait of the English people of to-day. ”

“ Vastness of design and solid workmanship are as distinctive properties of Roman art, as harmony of proportion and beauty of form are of the works of Greek imagination. To compose a literary work which should be representative of the genius of Rome, it was necessary that the author should be not only imbued with Roman sentiment and ideas, but also endowed with the Roman capacity for patient and persevering industry. ”

“ Augustan letters were formed by the Romans themselves, Augustan sculptures by Greek artists working under Roman dictation. The monuments of Rome afford the best examples on a great scale of the historic style of sculpture peculiar to that people, which is valuable in reference to their portrait art, a collateral department, such as biography is to general history. The series of busts in the Vatican, the Capitol, the Museo Borbonico, and at Florence, show how successfully this class of art was cultivated down to a very late period of the empire. ”

“ The empire, then, of ancient painting, appears to have been of brief continuance, for, beyond the age now under review, no memorials of its greatness remain. The Romans prized this, as they have been shown to value every accomplishment in the fine arts, as ministering to luxury, and as a worthy employment for their slaves. In the early portion of their iron reign, Etruscan captives decorated their houses—subsequently itinerant Greeks; and though we find a few names of Roman painters, we never find it carried among them beyond mere embellishment. The moral dignity of the art never revived. ”

“ If we could be sure of our ground in setting down realism as the Roman contribution to the history of Art, it would be a great achievement for Rome. Realism is undoubtedly a fine thing though idealism is a finer. Unfortunately it seems that Hellenic art in the eastern centres was developing realism, or at least illusionism, for itself on its own soil. ”

“ When we turn to Rome, little investigation is required to satisfy us that there is no such thing as an independent Roman ceramic art. Whatever Rome possessed was acquired from without, not developed from within. One could expect no artistic sense to manifest itself among the horde of refugees, outcasts, and criminals who surrounded Romulus in his little castle on the Palatine hill. His successor, Numa Pompilius, in aiming a blow at idolatry, may have also retarded the growth of art. ”

“ The mania for fine bindings of costly materials was later on the caprice of the learned Roman, not of the Greek.
The home of the “collector,” and consequently of his faithful companion, the faker, was Rome.
The Roman was not a born lover of art. In fact during19 the early and primitive period of its existence Rome had not only been somewhat negative as regards art, but was even rather averse from its enjoyment. It took centuries for the Roman to overcome the belief that matters of art were trifling amusements that might be left as toys to their conquered people. ”

“ So it is fair to say that Etruscan art and early Roman art were essentially Greek art. The earliest artists who are known to have painted in Rome had Greek names, such as Ekphantos, Damophilos, and Gargasos. Later on in history there are painters mentioned with Latin names, but there is little of interest related concerning them; in truth, Ludius (who is also called by various authors Tadius and Studius) is the only really interesting ancient Roman painter of whom we know. ”

“ The Roman architecture, as compared with that of India or of China, is only so far less barbarous, as it is more Grecian. In the arts the Romans were imitators, and they are hardly ever to be admired when they wandered from their pattern. Those structures in which they might best claim the praise of originality—namely—their vast amphitheatres, are rather monuments of wealth, luxury, and native ferocity of character, than of taste or intelligence. ”