would be little thought of archaising among Achaean poets.
[Footnote: Mr. Hall informs me that he no longer holds the opinion
that the poets archaised.]

A distinction has been made, it is true, between the poet and
other artists in this respect. Monsieur Perrot says, "The vase-
painter reproduces what he sees; while the epic poets endeavoured
to represent a distant past. If Homer gives swords of bronze to
his heroes of times gone by, it is because he knows that such were
the weapons of these heroes of long ago. In arming them with
bronze he makes use, in his way, of what we call "local
colour...." Thus the Homeric poet is a more conscientious
historian than Virgil!" [Footnote: La _Grete de l'Epopee_,
Perrot et Chipiez, p. 230.]

Now we contend that old uncritical poets no more sought for
antique "local colour" than any other artists did. M. Perrot
himself says with truth, "the _CHANSON DE ROLAND_, and all
the _Gestes_ of the same cycle explain for us the Iliad and
the Odyssey." [Footnote: op. cit., p. 5.] But the poet of the
_CHANSON DE ROLAND_ accoutres his heroes of old time in the
costume and armour of his own age, and the later poets of the same
cycle introduce the innovations of their time; they do not hunt
for "local colour" in the _CHANSON DE ROLAND_. The very words
"local colour" are a modern phrase for an idea that never occurred
to the artists of ancient uncritical ages. The Homeric poets, like
the painters of the Dipylon period, describe the details of life
as they see them with their own eyes. Such poets and artists never
have the fear of "anachronisms" before them. This, indeed, is
plain to the critics themselves, for they, detect anachronisms as