Why do ancient statues not have pupils?

Some of them do. The Sumerians, for example, tended to take it a bit too far: But many larger classical statues have carved ones (often designed to catch the light rather than as anatomically correct models, since the cornea would shade wrong in solid marble). read more

They were, in paint, the paint has since faded. The old Greek Roman statues were NOT unpainted white statues, they were mostly painted. the same goes for the terra cotta soldiers, when they were dug up some still had paint on them, but the researchers said that when they bring them up the paint basically faded into dust immediately. read more

The Greeks and Romans painted their statues in bright colours. They would have painted the eyes in. read more

The pupil serves two important functions - to control the illumination in the eye, and to improve the optical quality of the image on the retina. read more