ART. IX.-A BRITISH SCHOOL IN ROME. 1. The Imperial German Archæological Institute. By Ad. Michaelis (Journal of Hellenic Studies,' vol. x, pp. 190... 215). 2. Jahresbericht über die Thätigkeit des Kaiserlichen Deutschen Archeologischen Instituts. 1899. 3. Rapports de la Commission des Écoles d'Athènes et de Rome. Paris: 1899. 4. American Journal of Archæology. Reports of the Managing Committees of the American Schools of Classical Studies at Athens and Rome. 5. Annual of the British School at Athens, 1895-1899. London: Macmillan. T is probable that to the great majority of the readers of the Quarterly Review the institutions, whose history and achievements are recorded in the above-mentioned works, are unknown even by name. It is true that an educated visitor to Rome or Athens can scarcely fail to become aware of their existence and to hear the names of the distinguished scholars who direct them, or to observe the traces of their activity in the excavation of ancient sites and the discovery and description of ancient monuments. But of their origin and constitution, of their methods and aims, so little is generally known that even to Germans Professor Michaelis' account of the Imperial Archeological Institute came as a surprise; nor were Frenchmen much better informed about the scarcely less distinguished École Française d'Athènes until the celebration of its jubilee three years ago arrested their attention. Yet these institutions are worth considering, not only on account of the great services which they have rendered and are still rendering to learning, but because they afford the best possible illustration of the change which has passed over the study of archæology in the course of the nineteenth century. It is to the nineteenth century that they all belong, the oldest of them, the German Institute at Rome, having been founded in 1829, while the youngest, the American School at Rome, is only in the fifth year of its existence. They are, in fact, the product of what is called the scientific spirit, or, in other words, of the recognised necessity for the accurate study, comparison, and classification of originals, and for the organised and concerted labour of trained experts. A glance at the yearly reports of the German Archæological Institute, of the French Schools, or even of the younger and less perfectly equipped British School at Athens will show how far we have travelled since the days of the early Stewarts, when Thomas Howard, Earl of Arundel and Surrey, formed the collection of ancient marbles which still bears his naine, and which, it is pleasant to be able to add, has, after more than two centuries of neglect, been at last decently housed and properly arranged in the University Galleries at Oxford. Throughout the seventeenth century and the first half of the eighteenth, the study of ancient monuments was almost entirely confined to collectors and connoisseurs. The remains of ancient art were bought up in Italy or the Levant and transferred to English country houses or Roman palaces, where they were either kept as curiosities or, with the fatal assistance of the restorer, made to serve as effective decorations for the hall or gallery. But the last fifty years of the eighteenth century witnessed a gradual change. Otfried Müller, in his 'Handbook of the Archæology of Art,' dates the commencement of what he calls the scientific period at 1750. The publication of epoch-making works, such as Winckelmann's History of Ancient Art' and Lessing's Laokoon,' was accompanied and in part provoked by a great increase in the materials available for the critic's use, due to excavation and exploration. The buried treasures of Herculaneum had only recently been brought to light when Winckelmann visited Rome in 1755; and to the same period belong the researches of two Englishmen, Stuart and Revett, in Greece. These travellers, following in the footsteps of Spon and Wheler in the previous century, were themselves followed by a distinguished group of English explorers-Chandler, Leake, Gell, and Dodwell-who did as much to extend our knowledge of the sites, buildings, and other remains of antiquity as Winckelmann and Lessing had done to improve the methods of criticism and interpretation. A further result of the impulse thus given to the scientific study of antiquity was the formation of public museums, in which antiquities, till then scattered and difficult of access, were collected, arranged, and made easily accessible to the student. Among the most important of such museums was that established by Člement XIV in the Vatican in 1769, and that founded at Naples in 1787. The department of antiquities in the British Museum dates from 1772. The outbreak of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars checked for a time the advance of archæological study; but with peace in 1815 came renewed progress. The group of scholars who now took the lead in Germany and England, in France and Italy, aimed above all things at the reconstruction of the mind and life of classical antiquity by the exact study and scientific interpretation of its remains. There was inevitably a change in the estimate formed of the comparative value of these remains and in the treatment accorded to them. Coins and inscriptions, which even Winckelmann left on one side, began to take their place by the side of statues and vases. Originals, especially those of a good period, however fragmentary, rose in estimation as compared with late or second-hand productions, however decoratively effective the latter might be. Above all, restoration, which had once been almost a duty, became a blunder, if not a crime. The transition from the older point of view was of course gradual, as any one may see for himself, who will disinter and read the Report presented by the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Earl of Elgin's collection of sculptured marbles (1816). Therein he may note the divergence between the old school and the new. Above all things, however, the scholars of the early years of the nineteenth century were impressed with the necessity of increasing the facilities for the accurate comparison of remains; and this meant their exact reproduction and description in a form which should be fairly accessible. The idea of establishing channels of communication between students of antiquity, of making known to all persons interested the material dispersed among the collections, public or private, of Europe, and of notifying the discovery of new objects, found expression in various quarters. In 1827 E. Gerhard brought out the first part of his Antike Bildwerken,' the object of which was to place in the hands of archæologists and scholars accurate reproductions of unpublished monuments. In the next year Böttiger at Dresden started, in conjunction with several lovers of antiquity at home and abroad,' a periodical entitled 'Archäologie und Kunst,' which was intended to keep archaeologists in touch with each other and with the new discoveries. Among the contributions to the first number is a letter from the English antiquary James Millingen, whose reproductions of Greek vases had already won him a high reputation. The most conspicuous result of this desire at once to diffuse knowledge and to organise study was the foundation of what is now known to all scholars as the German Institute at Rome, the doyen of the archæological schools of Rome and Athens. It is now world-famous, and is worthily housed in its spacious home on the Capitol, with the Forum at its feet and with the Sabine and Alban hills bounding the distance. But its beginnings-and it is encouraging to those who are slowly building up the younger institutions that have followed in its wake to remember this were comparatively humble, and its resources, for the first thirty years of its existence, were of the slenderest. The origin and development of this remarkable foundation may be briefly described. Bunsen, writing from Rome in 1829, relates how E. Gerhard had been impressed with the disadvantages of isolated and disjointed research, and with the need of some central point of union, where scattered details might be collected, sifted, and preserved from oblivion. Not only Bunsen himself, but the Duc de Luynes in France, eagerly caught at the idea. The latter suggested a 'Journal de la Société Archéologique,' to be published in Paris, but this suggestion was put aside in favour of Bunsen's scheme of an 'Istituto di Corrispondenza Archeologica.' The Institute was to be divided into sections, the centres of which were to be in the principal towns of Europe, but with a single seat of administration in Rome. The scheme obtained the approval of the Crown Prince of Prussia, afterwards Frederick William IV, who became patron of the infant Institute, and assisted it with a small annual grant. It was warmly supported by scholars of various nationalities, and among the members of the first directorate-thirty in all-were, besides Bunsen, Gerhard, and the Duc de Luynes, James Millingen, Thorwaldsen, Borghese, Panofka, and Welcker. The original objects of the Institute are accurately defined by Gerhard himself, in an account of it written in 1840. It was intended to serve as a channel of communication between archæologists, to diffuse accurate knowledge of existing monuments, and to register new discoveries. With these objects in view the new Institute issued three publications, the monthly Bollettino,' the yearly 'Annali,' in which papers of greater length were published, and the Monumenti Inediti.' The early years of the Institute were years of difficulty and of a constant struggle with inadequate means. in 1835 it obtained a home of its own on the Capitol. I have succeeded,' writes Bunsen to Dr. Arnold, in setting up a spacious building for the Archæological Institute in the midst of the walls of the Porticus of Jupiter Optimus Maximus, and have opened it with a lecture on Goethe's saying, "Rome is the high-school of Europe."' At the same time the Institute began to lose something of its international character. Rome became its one centre, both of administration and publication; and the management passed almost entirely into German and Italian hands—a change which was completed when the foundation of the French School at Athens, in 1846, turned French attention and sympathies in a different direction. With the appointment of W. Henzen as secretary in 1856 a new depart But ment of work was established, and the Institute became what it has ever since been-not only a centre for the diffusion of knowledge, but a training place for young students. Finally, soon after the establishment of German unity, it was placed on a secure basis as a German institution, with a central board of direction in Berlin, and an income of 5000l. a year from the State. At the same time the German Institute at Athens was established, and placed, like its elder sister at Rome, under the general control of the Imperial German Archæological Institute. Germans may justly be proud of the work which these Institutes have accomplished, and which has extended far beyond the limits marked out by Gerhard and Bunsen. To the functions originally assigned to the infant Institute of Archæological Correspondence others have been added. The Institutes at Rome and Athens, in conjunction with the central board of direction in Berlin, still serve as channels of communication between archæologists, and register new discoveries. But they have also been for thirty years schools in which many of the best German archæologists have been trained, and workshops in which the labour of many scholars has been organised for the joint undertaking of tasks beyond the powers of any single worker. From the annual reports of the Imperial Archæological Institute-which include the separate reports from the directors of the Institutes at Rome and Athens, Dr. Petersen and Dr. Dörpfeld-some idea may be formed of the services which the Institutes are rendering to learning. The literary output is in itself of great importance. There are, first of all, the periodical publications, the Mittheilungen,' from Rome and Athens, the central 'Anzeiger,' and the 'Antike Denkmäler.' In addition there are the costly and sumptuous serials, in which the work of reproducing the extant remains and monuments of antiquity is carried on with systematic German thoroughness; the Corpus' of Latin inscriptions; the collections of ancient sarcophagi, of ancient terracottas, and, quite recently, of ancient ivories. Next to the publications, we may place the special missions undertaken by individual German scholars under the direction of the Institute; for instance, a visit recently made by Dr. Robert to England for the purpose of examining the rich but little known collections of prints and drawings which have long lain undisturbed, if not uncared for, in the library of Eton College. There is, lastly, what may be called the routine work of the Roman and Athenian Institutes the training of young students; the observation and description of discoveries made by the Italian or Greek authorities; the archæo 6 6 |