ON A BRONZE RAM, OF ANCIENT GREEK WORKMANSHIP, NOW IN THE MUSEUM AT PALERMO.

THE bronze ram figured in the lithograph is one of the noblest ornaments of the Museum at Palermo, and has hitherto1 remained undescribed and unpublished in this country.

To the kindness of Professor Antonino Salinas of Palermo, who accompanied me to the museum, I am indebted for the following measurements:-Height, 30 4-5 in.; length (from the root of the tail to the end of the left fore-foot) 50 4-5 in.; i.e. about life-size. The tail, the left hind leg (below the hock), and the left ear are recent restorations.

The local tradition, that the figure before us is one of four rams of Byzantine workmanship, cast by order of George Maniaces and by him brought to Sicily in 1040 A.D., by no means deserves implicit credence. All that can be said with certainty as to its history is, that two rams, of which the present is one, long adorned the entrance to the Torre di Maniace at Syracuse, until, in the year 1448, the Marchese di Geraci, Giovanni da Vintimiglia, received them from king Alphonso as the reward of an infamous service, and transported them to his palace at Castelbuono. On his grandson's banishment, they were confiscated with the rest of his property, and removed to the royal palace at Palermo, where, at the revolution of 1848, one fell a victim to the violence or rapacity of the mob, the other was, in the year 1860, bestowed by the present king on the museum now located in the ci-devant convent of the order of S. Philip Neri.

Strangely different as are the proportions of the figure before us from those which the scientific breeding of the last few years has given to our English ram, yet from its general symmetry and the vigour expressed in the suddenly turned head and half-open mouth, the best period of Greek art is that in which we would seek for the date of this noble bronze. The

1 A lithograph, and a brief essay from the pen of Professor Heydenau, appeared in the Archäologische Zeitung, N. S., Vol. III. of last year.

2 The murder of twenty Syracusan nobles of the opposition party, whom he had treacherously decoyed to a banquet.

artist, whether Calamis', or whosoever he may have been, has certainly not deserved the blame which Pliny' gives to Myron, 'animi sensus non expressisse, capillum quoque......non emendatius fecisse quam rudis antiquitas instituisset:' not only are the curls of the wool gracefully rendered, but the inflated nostril and partly raised leg skilfully betoken an upstarting in surprise and anger. The motive of the attitude must remain uncertain; the fact of there having been two rams may point to that "good old cause" of duels amongst stags also.

Worthy to bear Phrixus and Helle" is Göthe's expression of admiration on seeing the pair of which this is the survivor3; the hero and his sister, however, certainly rode pillionwise, if ancient art is to be trusted.

In Greek and Roman art, the ram, whether in the whole' figure or symbolized by a horn, finds frequent expression both in reference to the myth which has been already quoted and more often as a type of Jupiter Ammon. In the former sense Pompeii and Herculaneum each yield a frescoed group in illustration: the latter is suggested by the name of Ammonite, and is well known by frequent occurrence on the coins of Cyrene, Delphi, Tanagra, Tenos, Lysimachus, &c., where a ram is frequently associated with Hermes as being the tutelary divinity of focks and herds-ὅτι Ἑρμῆς μάλιστα δοκεῖ θεῶν ἐφορῶν καὶ avçew Toíuvas, as Pausanias informs us. His worship at Tanagra he refers to the belief that a plague in that city was suddenly stayed on a ram being solemnly carried round the walls. Relative to the connection of Hermes with Osiris and Egyptian ritual a sesterce' of M. Aurelius may be cited, which bears on its

1 Whose statue of Hermes bearing a ram on his shoulders is probably reproduced on the bronze coin of Tanagra, an engraving of which is given on the opposite page.

2 Hist. Nat. XXIV. 19.

8 Italiänische Reise, Vol. 1.

4 The denarii of the gens Rustia present an example of both kinds of illustration; here, perhaps, the ram is a type of rusticity.

5 Mus, Borbon. 11. 19, and vi. 19; cf. Ovid Fast. III. 865; Mart. Epigr. VIII. 51, 9-14.

6

II. 3, 4: compare Iv. 23 with v. 27 and IX. 22.

7 Quoted by Dr Newman (Preface to Fleury's Ecclesiastical History, p. cxix) in support of the miracle of the Thundering Legion (174 A.D.): the coin, however, is dated eight years earlier.

reverse a temple of Mercury, on the tympanum of which a ram is grouped with a cock, tortoise, caduceus, petasus, and purse'. The glyptic art also offers many illustrations of our subject, amongst which may be mentioned a sard (engraved in Impronte Gemmarie, and in King's Horace)-where a ram's head on a warrior's helmet, accompanied by a crook in the field, probably indicates a rebus on the name Philopoemen. Embossed on each side of the helmet of Athena, the ram's head is doubtless a symbol of persevering pugnacity. On a translucent heliotrope, now in the possession of the Public Orator, Ερμῆς κριοφόρος is figured seated with a cock, the emblem of vigilance, at his feet, and in his right hand a ram's head.

Coin of Tanagra in the British Museum (from an electrotype). Obv. Head of Apollo-adjuncts bow and mouse (?)-enclosed in a wreath of olive.

Rev. Hermes Kriophoros-legend TANATPAIN.

5

So, too, it appears on a vase from Volci, figured by Müller in the Denkmäler der alten Kunst, a type which seems to have been often adopted in later times by Christian artists as a symbol of the Good Shepherd. In the various illustrations of the worship of Cybele also the ram appears-sometimes serving as a steed for her devotee Atys, as on an ivory relief figured by Müller. On the coins of Antioch, the ram looking back on the sun and moon doubtless represented Aries, the zodiacal sign, under which the city was built. The song quoted by Aristophanes' τὸν κριὸν ὡς ἐπέχθη is probably a punning allusion to the name of the wrestler Krios, such as is seen in the favourite type of the gens Rustia, which has been alluded to already..

The explanation of this passage to which I wish to call attention is not a new one, though it has occurred to me quite independently of any research. It is at least as old as the 12th century, for it is found in Aben Ezra, and possibly may be older still. But though it seems to me the only true explanation, it has been treated somewhat cavalierly by commentators. It is simply this: the three Hebrew words above quoted form, not a single proposition, but a sentence of two clauses; the first word being the name which God communicates to Moses, and the other two the explanation of the name. So Aben Ezra, ", and its interpretation is 778 78; as (Zech. xii. 8), 'And the house of David shall be as God;' and after that, 'as the angel of Jehovah before them;' which is the interpretation of 'as God.""

If we read the previous verse, this will appear more clearly. "And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them?"

The answer to this question would surely be the communication of the name, and not an abstract proposition, like that which appears in our Authorized Version, "I am that I am," which is so printed as if the whole sentence were the name of God. But it is evident from the last clause of the verse that