Author: Albert Woltmann

Publisher: Forgotten Books

Published: 2015-06-26

Total Pages: 533

ISBN-13: 9781330397176

Excerpt from History of Ancient, Early Christian, and Medieval Painting In the study of painting, as in so many other studies, the critical and historical spirit of our age continues to be ever more and more actively at work. Since we have learnt to realise how large and vital a part of the genius of the past survives in the images of the painter, the labours of many industrious inquirers have been constantly directed towards the solution of chronological, personal, and technical problems connected with every period and phase of the art. At the same time, the inherent attraction of the subject has drawn towards it a constantly increasing measure of popular interest and curiosity. Hence there has made itself felt the need of an adequate general History of Painting, in which the scattered results of research should be collected and set forth for the benefit alike of the student and the general reader. This need one of the most distinguished of the several distinguished German historians of art, the late Professor Woltmann of Strassburg, undertook a few years ago to satisfy. The first volume of his work, carrying the subject from the dawn of ancient Egyptian down to the transformation of Italian mediaeval civilisation, is now laid before the English public. The standard general book on the subject has hitherto been the Handbook of Dr. Kugler, which, in its successive English editions, had the advantage of translation and revision by thoroughly accomplished hands. The present work not only represents the existing state of knowledge better than that of Kugler, but follows a more comprehensive plan, inasmuch as it prefixes to the story of Christian painting the story of painting as practised in Ancient Egypt, the Asiatic Empires,( Greece, and Rome; a portion of his task which Professor Woltmann confided to a highly instructed colleague. Dr. Woermann of Dusseldorf. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.