Egyptian sculpture

PREFACE

THERE has never probably been a time when greater interest has been shown in Egyptian art than exists at the present day. But this interest has not in all cases been accompanied by an adequate knowledge of its history and an intelligent appreciation of its finer qualities. The imposing and colossal monuments of later periods tend to impress visitors to Egypt and to the Egyptian collections in European museums, to the exclusion of the more living and original work of the earlier ages. And moreover, to us, accustomed as we are to the comparatively rapid rise and fall of national civilisations and arts, the immense duration in time of Egyptian history is bewildering and difficult to realise. For whatever chronology we adopt, the art of Egypt is to be measured by millennia, while that of Greece, for instance, is measured by centuries. And although in their long course there were many rises and declines, each of them occupying as long a period of time as many other national arts in the whole of their development and decay, the art of Egypt always remains Egyptian, so that no one who has even the most superficial knowledge would have any hesitation in identifying as Egyptian, works most widely separated in time. For, in spite of all vicissitudes, there is no break in continuity such as separates Crete from Greece, or Classical Rome from the Italian Renaissance. Yet there are differences between various periods and local schools as great and essential as can be found among widely separated nationalities, vi