第14章　寻宝者和秘密

你们有没有得过春困症？有没有两种春困症都得过呢？没错，春困症的确有两种。

你们还记不记得，在暖和的春日里，有时你们会觉得非常慵懒、昏昏欲睡、累得很，不想学习、不想工作、不想玩儿，甚至也不想吃东西呢？那就是春困症的一种。

还有，你们记不记得，自己在春天有时会觉得精力充沛、身强力壮并且烦躁不安呢？还记不记得，在这种时候，你们只想跑啊、叫啊、翻上几个跟斗呢？还记不记得，在这个时候，你们会觉得安静地坐上片刻都受不了呢？还记不记得，在这个时候，你们会觉得自己做得到任何难事，能够在任何方面打败任何人呢？这就是第二种春困症。

好吧，中世纪过后，整个世界都得上了春困症。不过，它得的可是第二种，即精力过旺的春困症；并且，这种症状并非只是在春季持续了一天两天，而是持续了多年哩。

公元1400年左右，意大利率先得上了这种春困症。就像阴暗的冬天过后，春天万物再次复苏，到处都是生机勃勃的绿叶和鲜花一样，黑暗的中世纪过后，艺术、文学、建筑、探索和贸易等领域也都再次迸发出了新的生机。这个再次迸发生机的时期，被称为“文艺复兴”时期；而所谓的“复兴”，就是重生的意思。

注意，使得世界陷入“文艺复兴”热潮的根源之一，便在于人们开始对古代的

buildings that had been buried in the ground since Roman times were dug up.Old Roman and Greek writings were brought to light and read again.By learning what the ancients had done in art, the Renaissance people were able to do great things in art too.

One of the first sculptors to make a thorough study of the Roman statues was named Donatello. He lived in Florence, but as a young man, he went to Rome with his friend Brunelleschi, an artist we have already met.In Rome the two friends spent their time hunting through the old ruins for any beautiful Roman artwork they could find.Brunelleschi was more interested in architecture and he measured the old Roman buildings while Donatello looked for sculpture.Soon people called them the Treasure Hunters because they always seemed to be looking for buried treasure.

When the two Treasure Hunters came back to Florence, Donatello made a beautiful marble cantoria, or singing gallery, for a choir on the wall at one end of a cathedral. He decorated the outside of the gallery with sculpture of little children who look like cupids dancing and singing.It is a wonderful piece of work, full of life and action.

Donatello's next famous statue was placed outside a church in Florence. It is of Saint George.Saint George was a Christian in the Roman army at a time when it was very unsafe to be a Christian.To show he was not afraid of being a Christian, he carried a shield that had a bright red cross on a white background on it.This symbol has ever since been called the cross of Saint George and is part of the flag of England because the English adopted Saint George as their favorite saint.Saint George was a brave man, and when the

技艺和知识产生了兴趣。那些自古罗马时期以来一直深埋于地下的雕塑作品和建筑，被人们发掘出来了。古罗马人和古希腊人的一些著作被公开发表出来，再次被人们阅读。通过了解古人在艺术方面的成就，“文艺复兴”时期的人也能够在艺术方面取得伟大的成就了。

率先对古罗马雕塑进行全面研究的一位雕塑家，名叫多纳泰罗。他住在佛罗伦萨，但年轻的时候就与朋友布鲁内莱斯基去过罗马；后者是一位艺术家，我们在前面已经提及过了。在罗马，这两位朋友将那些古老的废墟翻了个遍，搜寻能够找到的，所有精美的古罗马艺术品。布鲁内莱斯基对建筑艺术更感兴趣，因此他对古罗马的建筑一一进行了测量，而多纳泰罗则寻找着雕塑作品。不久之后，人们便称他们是“寻宝者”了，因为他们似乎始终都在寻找埋藏在地下的宝物。

这两位“寻宝者”回到佛罗伦萨之后，多纳泰罗便为一个唱诗班制作了一面非常精美的大理石廊台，名叫《唱诗班》，安放在一座大教堂一端的墙上。在这座廊台的外部，他还雕刻了许多载歌载舞的小朋友作为装饰，他们看上去就像是一群丘比特似的。这是一件精美绝伦的作品，既栩栩如生，又充满动感。

多纳泰罗下一件著名的雕塑作品，被安放在佛罗伦萨一座教堂之外。那是一尊圣乔治的塑像。圣乔治是古罗马军中的一名基督徒；而在当时，皈依基督教还是一件很不安全、很可能带来生命危险的事情呢。为了表明自己不惧怕皈依成基督徒，他手持一面盾牌，盾牌上面标有一个鲜艳的白底红色十字架。此后，这个标志便被称为“圣乔治十字架”，并且成了英国国旗的一部分，因为圣乔治是英国人最喜欢的一位圣徒。圣乔治是一个勇敢无畏的人，在古罗马皇帝开始迫害基督徒之后，他

Roman emperor began to persecute the Christians, he went to him and asked him to stop.For this, and because Saint George was a Christian, the emperor had him killed.

Of course Donatello didn't know what the real Saint George looked like because the man who became the saint had lived so long before, so this statue is not a portrait statue. Instead it is what Donatello thought a brave young Christian officer in the Roman army ought to look like.And because so many other people thought this was what Saint George ought to look like, too, the statue became very famous.It is very lifelike.

“There is only one problem with it，”someone told Donatello.

“What is that?”asked the sculptor, who was afraid the man had found some fault in the statue.

“The trouble is, it can't speak，”said the man.

Donatello's most famous work was of a man on horseback. I'll tell you about that in the next chapter, for in this chapter I still have to tell you about a secret.Can you keep a secret?

A sculptor who was a friend of Donatello's had a secret. It was a very good secret and he didn't tell anyone except his adopted son.The adopted son had five sons of his own, and when they grew up they were let in on the

曾跑到皇帝面前，要求皇帝停止迫害呢。正是由于这个，由于圣乔治是一名基督徒，罗马皇帝便命人将他杀害了。

当然，多纳泰罗并不知道圣乔治真正的长相，因为那位圣徒生活在很久很久以前，所以，这尊雕像并不是一座肖像雕塑。相反，雕像的样子是多纳泰罗想象出来的，因为他觉得，古罗马军队中一位勇敢的基督教军官应该就是那个样子。由于许多人也都认为圣乔治应当是那个样子，因此这尊雕像便变得闻名遐迩了。这座塑像，雕刻得也非常逼真。

“只有一个问题。”有人曾经对多纳泰罗说。

“什么问题呢？”这位雕塑家问道。他担心的是，那个人是不是在这座雕塑上找出了什么瑕疵。

“问题就是，他不会说话。”那人回答道。

多纳泰罗最著名的一件作品，是一尊骑马者的雕像。我会到下一章再跟你们来介绍这件作品，因为在这一章，我还得告诉你们一个秘密。你们能够保守秘密吗？

多纳泰罗的一位朋友也是雕塑家，他有一个秘密。那是一个绝妙的秘密，除了

secret too.It was a family secret.

The sculptor with the secret was Luca della Robbia. Like Donatello, he lived in Florence.He was a little younger than Donatello, and so we call him the second great sculptor of the Renaissance.Luca della Robbia made statues in marble and bronze.One of his marble works was a singing gallery for an end wall in the same cathedral as Donatello's marble gallery.

Luca della Robbia carved singing boys on this gallery as Donatello had on his. The two galleries are called the Singing Galleries.Luca della Robbia's looks better than Donatello's when you are close to it because it is smoother and more finished.But when you are looking at the galleries from the floor of the cathedral, Donatello's figures stand out better because they are rougher, so it's about even between them.They are both so valuable that they are now in a museum instead of in the cathedral.

But we've almost forgotten about the secret.

自己的养子，他可没跟任何人说过哩。他的养子生了五个儿子，而待这五个儿子长大成人后，他们也获准得知了这个秘密。所以，这算是一个家族秘密呢。

拥有这个秘密的那位雕塑家，名叫卢卡·德拉·罗比亚。跟多纳泰罗一样，他也住在佛罗伦萨。他的年纪比多纳泰罗小一点儿，因此我们称他是“文艺复兴”时期第二位伟大的雕塑家。卢卡·德拉·罗比亚制作了许多大理石雕塑和青铜雕塑。他有一件大理石雕塑作品，也是一座唱诗班的廊台，并且安放在多纳泰罗那座大理石廊台所在的同一座大教堂的另一端。

与多纳泰罗一样，卢卡·德拉·罗比亚也在这座廊台上雕刻了许多唱着赞美诗的小男孩。这两座廊台，合称为《唱诗班廊台》。假如靠近去细看的话，卢卡·德拉·罗比亚的作品似乎还要优于多纳泰罗的作品，因为他雕刻的廊台，要比多纳泰罗的那座廊台更加光滑，打磨得也更加精巧。不过，倘若站在大教堂的地上来看这两座廊台的话，那么多纳泰罗雕刻的人物则更加明显，因为它们都比较粗糙。所以，这两座廊台其实是势均力敌，各有千秋。它们都极其珍贵，因此如今被藏进了博物馆，不再放在大教堂里了。

可我们差点儿都记不起还有秘密这回事了。卢卡·德拉·罗比亚发现，用大理石来雕刻很费工夫，并且大理石购买起来也很昂贵。每次完成作品并获得报酬之

Luca della Robbia found it took a great deal of time to carve in marble, and marble was very expensive to buy.When he finished and was paid for his work, he often found that he hadn’t made much money.Bronze had the same drawbacks.He decided to try to find another material that was inexpensive and could be used quickly.He found it.What do you think it was?Not wood or stone, and of course not marble or bronze.It was clay.

“Well，”you say，“even the Greeks used clay. I remember the terra-cotta figurines of Tanagra.”

True, but wait. Luca della Robbia used terra cotta, but here comes his secret.After he finished a clay statue, he put over it a coating of porcelain, which, when hardened, is something like glass.Then he baked the figure in an oven for just the right length of time.His secret was in mixing the porcelain, or glaze as it was called.When it was finished, the porcelain glaze would resist the rain and bad weather almost as well as marble, whereas the terra cotta without the glaze would soon crumble away.Other sculptors tried it but none did as fine of work in glazed terra cotta as Luca della Robbia.His secret glazing process was very successful.

Most of the sculpture Luca della Robbia did in glazed terra cotta was in relief. The relief part was generally white like marble but the background was a beautiful shade of blue.

Luca della Robbia taught his nephew, whom he had adopted as a son, the secret of the glazed terra cotta. The nephew's name was Andrea della Robbia and he became almost as famous as Luca.Andrea did most of his work in glazed terra cotta and he added many

后，他常常发现自己赚不到什么钱。青铜也存在着同样的问题。于是，他决心找到另一种价格不贵，又能迅速利用的雕刻材料。后来，他的确找到了这样一种材料。你们猜猜，是什么材料呢？它既不是木材，也不是石料，当然更不是大理石和青铜了。这种材料，便是陶土。

“哦，”你们会说，“连古希腊人也用过陶土。我还记得塔纳格拉的小陶俑呢。”

的确如此；不过，你们还是先等一等，听我解释吧。卢卡·德拉·罗比亚用的，的确是陶土；可他的秘密，也正是在这里。雕完一尊陶土雕塑后，他会在雕塑上面涂一层瓷釉；这层瓷釉硬化之后，有点儿像是玻璃。然后，他会将雕像放进一座炉子里，烧制适当的一段时间。他的秘密，便在于调制瓷釉的过程，也就是人们所称的“上釉”。完工之后，这层瓷釉便既能防雨，又不怕日晒风吹，几乎可与大理石媲美了；而没有上釉的陶土制品，却会很快破损。虽说其他一些雕塑家也曾尝试过这种方法，但没有一个人像卢卡·德拉·罗比亚那样制作出了精美的上釉陶土雕塑品。他的这种上釉过程的秘诀，的确获得了巨大的成就哩。

卢卡·德拉·罗比亚制作的绝大部分上釉陶土雕塑品，都是浮雕。通常来说，浮雕部分都是白色的，就像大理石一样；而作品的背景，却是一层美丽的蓝色。

卢卡·德拉·罗比亚把给陶土雕塑上釉的秘诀教给了自己的侄子，也就是他的养子。这位侄子名叫安德里亚·德拉·罗比亚，后来还变得几乎与卢卡一样有名了。安德里亚的绝大部分作品，都是上釉的陶土雕塑；并且，他还给自己制作的

more colors to his reliefs, although he generally left the flesh part of his statues white.His best examples were reliefs of the Madonna and Child.

Andrea did a series of terra-cotta high reliefs of babies in swaddling clothes for the outside of a children's hospital and orphanage in Florence. Swaddling clothes are strips of cloth wrapped around and around the body of a newborn baby to keep it still and quiet.Each baby is on a separate round background.You may have seen plaster casts of these babies, but the plaster casts are white and do not show the colors that Andrea della Robbia put on the originals.Each figure is called a bambino, which means baby in Italian.

Luca Della Robbia is also famous for extending the relief by adding to it a frame that looks like a wreath of greens decorated with fruit. Today many wreaths of greens decorated with fruit are called Della Robbia for his famous relief frames.

浮雕作品增添了多种颜色，但雕塑的主体部分通常仍是白色的。他的代表作，就是《圣母与圣子》系列浮雕。

安德里亚还为佛罗伦萨一家儿童医院兼孤儿院的外墙创作了一系列陶土高浮雕，其中的形象都是襁褓中的婴儿。所谓的“襁褓”，就是婴儿出生后，为了让婴儿安安静静、不哭不闹而一层层地缠在婴儿身上的那种布条。每座婴儿浮雕，都雕刻在一个单独的圆形基底之上。你们可能已经见过这些婴儿浮雕的石膏复制品了；不过，石膏复制品是白色的，显示不出安德里亚·德拉·罗比亚在原件上创作的各种颜色来。每一座婴儿雕像，都被称为“班比诺”（bambino）；在意大利语中，班比诺就是婴儿的意思。

卢卡·德拉·罗比亚还因为给浮雕作品加上了一个看上去就像是一圈点缀着水果的绿叶外框而变得非常有名。如今，许多点缀着水果的绿叶花环，都因为他那种著名的浮雕边框而被称为“德拉·罗比亚环”呢。