Not very much Greek sculpture has survived for us to see. You might think it would last well, being made mostly of limestone and marble , but both limestone and marble can be burned and turned into lime, which is one of the ingredients of cement. In the Middle Ages , most Greek statues were not valued, and they were burned in lime kilns to make cement. Practically all big Greek archaeological sites have medieval lime kilns in the middle of them.
Some Greek sculpture is known from Roman copies which have survived.
Greek sculpture is divided into seven main periods, though we are not always sure which period a statue belongs in.