Certain silver coins of Demetrius Poliorcetes, who reigned 306-286 B.C., bear upon one side a Victory which agrees closely with her of Samothrace, even to the great prow-pedestal.  The type is supposed on good grounds to commemorate an important naval victory won by Demetrius over Ptolemy in 306.  In view, then, of the close resemblance between coin-type and statue, it seems reasonably certain that the Victory was dedicated at Samothrace by Demetrius soon after the naval battle with Ptolemy and that the commemorative coins borrowed their design directly from the statue.  Thus we get a date for the statue, and, what is more, clear evidence as to how it should be restored.  The goddess held a trumpet to her lips with her right hand and in her left carried a support such as was used for the erection of a trophy.  The ship upon which she has just alighted is conceived as under way, and the fresh breeze blows her garments backward in tumultuous folds.  Compared with the Victory of Paeonius (Figs. 143, 144) this figure seems more impetuous and imposing.  That leaves us calm; this elates us with the sense of onward motion against the salt sea air.  Yet there is nothing unduly sensational about this work.  It exhibits a magnificent idea, magnificently rendered.

From this point on no attempt will be made to preserve a chronological order, but the principal classes of sculpture belonging to the Hellenistic period will be illustrated, each by two or three examples.  Religious sculpture may be put first.  Here the chief place belongs to the Aphrodite of Melos, called the Venus of Milo (Fig. 173).  This statue was found by accident in 1820 on the island of Melos (Milo) near the site of the ancient city.  According to the best evidence available, it was lying in the neighborhood of its original pedestal, in a niche of some building.  Near it were found a piece of an upper left arm and a left hand holding an apple; of these two fragments the former certainly and perhaps the latter belong to the statue.  The prize was bought by M. de Riviere, French ambassador at Constantinople, and presented by him to the French king, Louis XVIII.  The same vessel which conveyed it to France brought some other marble fragments from Melos, including a piece of an inscribed statue-base with an artist’s inscription, in characters of the second century B.C. or later.  A drawing exists of this fragment, but the object itself has disappeared, and in spite of much acute argumentation it remains uncertain whether it did or did not form a part of the basis of the Aphrodite.

Still greater uncertainty prevails as to the proper restoration of the statue, and no one of the many suggestions that have been made is free from difficulties.  It seems probable, as has recently been set forth with great force and clearness by Professor Furtwangler, [Footnote:  “Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture,” pages 384 ff.] that the figure is an adaptation from an Aphrodite of the fourth century, who rests her left foot upon a helmet and, holding a shield on her left thigh, looks at her own reflection.  On this view the difficulty of explaining the attitude of the Aphrodite of Melos arises from the fact that the motive was created for an entirely different purpose and is not altogether appropriate to the present one, whatever precisely that may be.