There is no direct tradition which links these strange beginnings with our own days, but these is a direct tradition, handed down from master to pupil, and from pupil to admirer or copyist, which links the art of our own days, any house or any poster, with the art of the Nile Valley of some five thousand years ago.
但是，我们今天的艺术，不管是哪一所房屋或者哪一张招贴画，跟大约五千年前尼罗河流域的艺术之间，却有一个直接联系的传统，从师傅传给弟子，再从弟子传给爱好者或模仿者。引自第55页They tell us of a land which was so thoroughly organized that it was possible to pile up these gigantic mounds in the lifetime of a single king, and they tell us of kings who were so rich and powerful that they could force thousands and thousands of workers or slaves to toil for them year in, year out, to quarry the stones, to drag them to the building site, and to shift them with the most primitive means till the tomb was ready to receive the king.
它们告诉我们，一个国家被彻底地组织起来，所以有可能在一个孤家寡人的有生之年垒起那些大山；它们告诉我们，国王有钱有势，能够强迫成千上万的劳动者和奴隶为他们年复一年地辛苦劳动，开采石头，拉到工地，然后再用最原始的方法去搬动建造，知道坟墓里能收葬国王为止。引自第55页One Egyptian word for sculptor was actually 'He-who-keeps-alive'.
在埃及，雕刻家一词当初本义就是“使人生存的人”。
He was concerned only with essentials. Every lesser detail he left out.
他只关心基本的东西，次要的细节一概略去。
This combination of geometric regularity and keen observation of nature is characteristic of all Egyptian art.
几何形式的规整和对自然的犀利观察，将二者结合起来乃是一切埃及艺术的特点。引自第58页It must not be supposed that Egyptian artists thought that human beings looked like that. They merely followed a rule which allowed them to include everything in the human form that they considered important.
千万不要设想埃及艺术家认为人看起来就是那个样子，他们不过是遵循着一条规则，以便把重要的东西都纳入一个人的形状之中。引自第61页Here as always, Egyptian art is not based on what the artist could see at a given moment, but rather on what he knew belonged to a person or a scene.
埃及艺术不是立足于艺术家在一个特定的时刻所能看到的东西，而是立足于他所知道的一个人或一个场面所具有的东西。引自第62页It is one of the greatest things in Egyptian art that all the statues, paintings and architectural forms semm to fall into place as if they obeyed one law. We call such a law, which all creations of a people seem to obey, a 'style'. It is very difficult to explain in words what makes a style, but it is far less difficult to see.
埃及艺术最伟大的特色之一就是，所有的雕像、绘画和建筑形式彷佛都遵循着同一条法则，各得其所。如果一个民族的全部创造物都服从于一个法则，我们就把这一法则叫做“风格”。很难用语言说明一种风格是由什么构成的，但是用眼睛去看就容易得多。引自第65页
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