No.42-2RELIEF FROM THE ALTAR OF PEACE（《和平祭坛浮雕》）Although the Romans weren’t so good as the Greeks in making statues in the round，they did make some excellent bas reliefs.All boys like the reliefs showing the campaigns of the Emperor Trajan.They show the Roman soldiers marching，camping，fighting，taking a city，capturing prisoners，and carrying off the spoils of war.Trajan’s campaign was carved on a marble column and the sculptured band winds like a corkscrew round and round the column from the bottom to the top.The column is still standing in Rome and is called Trajan’s Column.
Another famous relief is carved on the Altar of the Peace of Augustus which the Roman Senate ordered erected in l3B.c.when the Emperor Augustus came back from putting down revolts in the western part of the Roman Empire.
If any one should ask you what kind of sculpture the Romans did best，just tell them，“Reliefs and busts.”
【中文阅读】
爸爸、妈妈或老师有没有说不要用“bust”来指某人长胖了呢？用“bust”来指人发胖，是你英语蹩脚，用词不当。我同意父母和老师的提醒。你应该说burst（发胖）。
现在我来介绍一下如何使用“bust”这个词，而且父母和老师都乐意听我们使用。在不规范的英语中“bust”就是“burst”的意思，常被混用；而在规范英语中，“bust”是“半身像”的意思。所谓半身像，有时候仅指脑袋和脖子，有时候却把肩膀和胸部都算在内。而雕刻的半身像看上去就像某某某，所以我们看到时就会说：“为什么这像看上去像布朗先生？”或说：“这真像琼斯·爱丽丝。”或说：“太像汤米·斯密斯了。”半身像也叫“半身雕像”。
古埃及人刻过一些很好的半身雕像，但是刻得最好的还是古罗马人。古罗马人的半身雕像刻得非常逼真，就像我们走在大街上看见的路人。古希腊人刻像时，喜欢给人物安上希腊鼻，尽管许多希腊人并没长着希腊鼻。但古罗马人却喜欢把半身像刻得跟真人一样。如果某人长着歪鼻子或双下巴，古罗马雕刻家就会照样刻下歪鼻子或双下巴。如果某人愁容满面，雕刻家照样把他刻成愁容满面。
在罗马，凡有支付能力的家庭都会给家庭成员刻一座半身像。这些半身像会代代相传，所以一个古老家族里往往会有许多祖先们的半身像。一旦某家有人去世了，这家会在沿街出殡时带上全部的家族半身雕像。如果真碰到这样一支殡葬队，我们可能会惊叹孙子跟他手里捧的祖父半身像有多么相像。
每一位罗马君主都刻有几百座自身的半身像，分送到罗马帝国各大城重镇。下图是尤利乌斯·恺撒的半身像。你觉得他看上去像你认识的哪个人吗？这时候使用bust 就对了。
除了半身像外，罗马人并不擅长在圆柱上雕像。所以，罗马人在征服希腊后，从希腊带回了所能找到的所有著名希腊雕像。他们还将希腊雕刻家带回国内，让他们在罗马刻像。但在罗马刻的雕像许多并非原创，而是希腊名雕的摹制品。由于许多优秀的希腊雕像已经丢失，所以对我们来说，能拥有这些希腊雕像的摹制品也是幸事一桩。我们要是没有挖出这些罗马的摹制品，也就没法知道这些雕像的原样。你还记得米隆的《掷铁饼者》吗？米隆的原作早已丢失，无法找到，但通过罗马的几件摹制品，我们就能知道原作的风采。
尽管罗马人不像希腊人那样擅长在圆柱上雕像，但他们也的确刻过几件很棒的浅浮雕。男孩子们都很喜欢看那展现图拉真大帝东征的浮雕。这些浮雕使我们看到了罗马士兵们行军、扎营、作战、攻克城镇、追捕囚犯以及缴获战利品的场景。图拉真大帝东征的场景刻在一个大理石圆柱上，而群像就像螺丝一样沿着柱身从底绕到顶。如今，这根圆柱依然屹立在罗马，称作“图拉真记功柱”。
另一件著名的浮雕要算奥古斯都和平祭坛浮雕。公元前13年，当奥古斯都大帝平定罗马帝国西部叛乱后凯旋时，元老院下令建造了这座祭坛。
如果有人问你罗马人最擅长刻哪种雕像，你就回答：“浮雕和半身像。”
STORIES IN STONES
石头里的故事
WHAT would you call men who went about with hammers and broke all the statues they could find，and who even went into churches and broke the statues there？Probably you would say they were bad men or crazy and should be locked up.
You would be right，and they would be locked up nowadays.But long ago （about 800A.D.）such men were not bad or crazy，and no one tried to lock them up.They broke statues because they thought statues were too much like idols.They thought a church especially should have nothing like an idol or an image in it.An image is called in Greek an icon and these men were called iconoclasts，which means image smashers.They smashed a great many statues，and the poor sculptors had to move away from the cities where the iconoclasts were if they still wanted to make statues.
However，the iconoclasts didn’t seem to mind small sculptures in relief.And so in the time of the iconoclasts and for many years afterward many beautiful bas reliefs in ivory，silver，and gold were made.The carvings in ivory were used as the covers of books，writing tablets，and little boxes.The place to see them now is in museums where they are kept carefully in glass cases.When you look at them，remember the iconoclasts and why there were no good statues in the full round for a long time after the Romans.
Some sculptors had to leave Byzantium—the old name for Constantinople which was the old name for Istanbul—because of the iconoclasts.They traveled to France and carried on their work there.And it is to France that we turn for our next great statues.They belong to the Middle Ages，several hundred years after the iconoclasts.And，strangely enough，these statues were all carved for churches—just what the iconoclasts didn’t want！In fact，the churches were simply covered with statues，which were made of the same kind of stone as the buildings and not of marble like the Greek and Roman statues.These statues were really part of the churches.The cathedral at Chartres，in France，has not less than ten thousand figures of men and animals on it.They are everywhere—over the doorways，on the columns，on the roof，under the windows，on the walls.Even the waterspouts are carved in the forms of queer animals.
Most of the people of the Middle Ages could neither read nor write，so all these sculptures on the churches took the place of books.They told the people stories of the Bible and of the saints.You see they were useful as well as ornamental.
They are called Gothic figures because churches anti cathedrals of the Middle Ages were built in the Gothic style.The Gothic figures on a cathedral are of almost every kind of living thing you could think of.There are scenes from the Bible，statues of saints，carvings of animals and flowers，pictures in stone of the seasons，of different kinds of work like farming and writing，wood chopping and fighting There are figures of men and women，of actual creatures and of strange unheard-of make-believe creatures.And each of these figures was made for that particular part of the cathedral where it was placed.The statues were not stuck on after the cathedral was built.They were a part of it，built into it，and made of the same stone.
Do you remember when you had a sore throat and had to gargle？On the Gothic churches there are statues that gargle.They don’t have sore throats，of course，but they gargle every time it rains.They are rain spouts and have holes in them so water can run out through their mouths.Like the statues that told the stories of the Bible，they are useful as well as ornamental.We call them gargoyles，which is another way of saying they gargle.
