Handbook of archaeology, Egyptian - Greek - Etruscan - Roman . asses of shadow which make them conspicuous. They repre-sent the contests between the Centaurs and the Athenians. BAS-RELIEFS. 205 sculptured metopes of the temples of Selinus, in Sicily, afford ex-amples of the earliest styles of alto-rilievo. Mezzo-rilievo was generally used to adorn sculptured vases andurns. These sculptured vases probably ornamented interiors, whereany indistinctness in their distant effect, or in unfavourable light,might be obviated by closer inspection. The celebrated Mediceanand Borghesan vases, the finest k
Handbook of archaeology, Egyptian - Greek - Etruscan - Roman . asses of shadow which make them conspicuous. They repre-sent the contests between the Centaurs and the Athenians. BAS-RELIEFS. 205 sculptured metopes of the temples of Selinus, in Sicily, afford ex-amples of the earliest styles of alto-rilievo. Mezzo-rilievo was generally used to adorn sculptured vases andurns. These sculptured vases probably ornamented interiors, whereany indistinctness in their distant effect, or in unfavourable light,might be obviated by closer inspection. The celebrated Mediceanand Borghesan vases, the finest known examples, are ornamentedwith mezzi-rilievi. The frieze encircling the choragic monument ofLysicrates is also in mezzo-rilievo. Mezzo-rilievo was also employed(as well as alto-rilievo, when in situations not exposed to accidents)to ornament tombs and sarcophagi. Bas-relief, or basso-rilievo, may be fully exemplified in the mostperfect examples of that art in the celebrated Panathenaic frieze ofthe Parthenon. It was executed under the direction of Phidias. BAS-RELIEF. himself; it was one uninterrupted series of bas-reliefs, which occu-pied the upper part of the Parthenon within the colonnade, andwhich was continued entirely around the building. By its positionit only obtained a secondary light. Being placed immediately belowthe soffit, it received all its light from between the columns, and byreflection from the pavement below. The flatness of the sculptureis thus sufficiently accounted for; had the relief been prominent, theupper parts could not have been seen; the shade projected by thesculpture would have rendered it dark, and the parts would havebeen reduced by their shadows. The subject represents the sacred 206 HANDBOOK OF ARCHEOLOGY. procession, which was celebrated every fifth year at Athens, inhonour of Minerva, conveying in solemn pomp to the temple of theParthemon the iriirXo^ or sacred veil, which was to be suspended be-fore the statue of the goddess within the t
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