(Praef. ad lib. vii.) to have invented scene-painting,
and to have painted a scene (scenam fecit) for a tragedy which Aeschylus
exhibited. As this appears to contradict Aristotle's assertion (Poet.
4.16), that scene-painting was introduced by Sophocles, some scholars understand Vitruvius to
mean merely, that Agatharchus constructed a stage. (Compare Hor. Ep ad.
Pis. 279 : et modicis instraxit pulpita tignis.) But the context
shews clearly that perspective painting must be meant, for Vitruvius goes on to say, that
Democritus and Anaxagoras, carrying out the principles laid down in the treatise of
Agatharchus, wrote on the same subject, shewing how, in drawing, the lines ought to be made to
correspond, according to a natural proportion, to the figure which would be traced out on an
imaginary intervening plane by a pencil of rays proceeding from the eye, as a fixed point of
sight, to the several points of the object viewed.
It was probably not till towards the end of Aeschylus's career that scene-painting was introduced, and not till the time of Sophocles that it was generally made use of; which may account for what Aristotle says.
There was another Greek painter of the name of Agatharchus, who was a native of the island
of Samos, and the son of Eudemus. He was a contemporary of Alcibiades and Zeuxis. We have no
definite accounts respecting his performances, but he does not appear to have been an artist
of much merit : he prided himself chiefly on the ease and rapidity with which he finished his
works. (in Alcib. p. 31. 15)
tell an anecdote of Alcibiades having inveigled Agatharchus to his house and kept him there
for more than three months in striet durance, compelling him to adorn it with his pencil. The
speech of Andocides above referred to seems to have been delivered after the destruction of
Melos (Arch. d. Kunst, p. 88.)