Roman Statues Research Articles

Reinventing Romanitas

Abstract Based on fresh archival research this article examines the exchange of Romanizing statuary between Italy and Spain during the ventennio fascista. Between 1933 and 1943, Italy and Spain exchanged copies of Roman statues as symbolic gestures, to substantiate their claims to a shared classical heritage of ‘imperial greatness’. Using press reports and documentary film excerpts the article reconstructs public events that took place in Merida, Tarragona, Palma, and Zaragoza and assesses their impact. Behind these exchanges, and public ceremonies staged on their occasion, lay the Fascist concept of romanità: an archaeologically and aesthetically charged discourse placing Late-Republican and Early-Imperial Roman heritage in the epicentre of Fascist identity politics. Through improvised public performances of romanità, classical materialities, monumental as well as spatial, were imbued with Fascist dynamics, as the past turned into the present and projected into the future. Through individual and collective performance these ceremonies embodied a primeval Fascist ideal that appeared at once spectacular and modern.

Adalékok Marczibányi István (1752–1810) műgyűjteményének történetéhez

The art collection of István Marczibányi (1752–1810), remembered as the benefactor of the Hungarian nation, who devoted a great part of his fortune to religious, educational, scientific and social goals, is generally known as a collection of ‘national Antiquities’ of Hungary. This opinion was already widespread in Hungarian publicity at the beginning of the 19th century, when Marczibányi pledged that he would enrich the collection of the prospective Hungarian national Museum with his artworks. But the description of his collection in Pál Wallaszky’s book Conspectus reipublicae litterariae in Hungaria published in 1808 testifies to the diversity and international character of the collection. In the Marczibányi “treasury”, divided into fourteen units, in addition to a rich cabinet for coins and medals there were mosaics, sculptures, drinking vessels, filigree-adorned goldsmiths’ works, weapons, Chinese art objects, gemstones and objects carved from them (buttons, cameos, caskets and vases), diverse marble monuments and copper engravings. Picking, for example, the set of sculptures, we find ancient Egyptian, Greek and Ro man pieces as well as mediaeval and modern masterpieces arranged by materials.After the collector’s death, his younger brother Imre Marczibányi (1755–1826) and his nephews Márton (1784–1834), János (1786–1830), and Antal (1793–1872) jointly inherited the collection housed in a palace in dísz tér (Parade Square) in Buda. In 1811, acting on the promise of the deceased, the family donated a selection of artworks to the national Museum: 276 cut gems, 9 Roman and Byzantine imperial gold coins, 35 silver coins and more than fifty antiquities and rarities including 17th and 18th-century goldsmiths’ works, Chinese soap-stone statuettes, ivory carvings, weapons and a South Italian red-figure vase, too. However, this donation did not remain intact as one entity. With the emergence of various specialized museums in the last third of the 19th century, a lot of artworks had been transferred to the new institutions, where the original provenance fell mostly into oblivion.In the research more than a third of the artworks now in the Hungarian national Museum, the Museum of Applied Arts and the Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest could be identified, relying on the first printed catalogue of the Hungarian national Museum (1825) titled Cimeliotheca Musei Nationalis Hungarici, and the handwritten acquisition registers. The entries have revealed that fictitious provenances were attached to several items, since the alleged or real association with prominent historical figures played an important role in the acquisition strategies of private collectors and museums alike at the time. For example, an ivory carving interpreted in the Cimeliotheca as the reliquary of St Margaret of Hungary could be identified with an object in the Metalwork Collection of the Museum of Applied Arts (inv. no. 18843), whose stylistic analogies and parallels invalidate the legendary origin: the bone plates subsequently assembled as a front of a casket were presumably made in a Venetian workshop at the end of the 14th century.There are merely sporadic data about the network of István Marczibányi’s connections as a collector, and about the history of his former collection remaining in the possession of his heirs. It is known that collector Miklós Jankovich (1772–1846) purchased painted and carved marble portraits around 1816 from the Marczi bányi collection, together with goldsmiths’ works including a coconut cup newly identified in the Metalwork Collection of the Museum of Applied Arts (inv. no. 19041). The group of exquisite Italian Cinquecento bronze statuettes published by art historian Géza Entz (1913–1993), was last owned as a whole by Antal Marczibányi (nephew of István) who died in 1872. These collection of small bronzes could have also been collected by István Marczibányi, then it got scattered through inheritance, and certain pieces of it landed in north American and European museums as of the second third of the 20th century. Although according to Entz’s hypothesis the small bronzes were purchased by István’s brother Imre through the mediation of sculptor and art collector István Ferenczy (1792–1956) studying in Rome, there is no written data to verify it. By contrast, it is known that the posthumous estate of István Marczibányi included a large but not detailed collection of classical Roman statues in 1811, which the heirs did not donate to the national Museum. It may be presumed that some of the renaissance small bronzes of mythological themes following classical prototypes were believed to be classical antiquities at the beginning of the 19th century. Further research will hopefully reveal more information about the circumstances of their acquisition.

Classical Art: A Life History from Antiquity to the Present

Classical Art: A Life History from Antiquity to the Present

Review: The Afterlife of Greek and Roman Sculpture: Late Antique Responses and Practices, edited by Troels Myrup Kristensen and Lea Stirling

Troels Myrup Kristensen and Lea Stirling, eds. The Afterlife of Greek and Roman Sculpture: Late Antique Responses and Practices . Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2016. 424 pp. 91 illustrations and 1 table. ISBN: 9780472119691. $85.00. Late Antiquity was a period of great change in the Roman Empire, when Christianity became the dominating religion, old traditions were abandoned, and temples were destroyed or adapted to suit new secular or religious purposes. In this process, the statuary decorating the private, official, and religious buildings and open areas was either preserved and reused in new contexts, destroyed and reused as spolia in building structures, or burned in lime-kilns to provide lime for new building works. Troels Myrup Kristensen and Lea Stirling have assembled a collection of papers on this highly interesting topic that developed out of two international seminars held at Aarhus University in 2008 and 2011. The final product engagingly analyzes the reuse and afterlife of ancient sculpture in Late Antiquity, and we may congratulate the editors for managing to gather an impressive group of international scholars to discuss and publish the results of their most recent studies. The volume presents a selection of case studies for the history of Greek and Roman statues in Late Antiquity from various parts of the Roman world. The editors provide in their introduction a general view for the topic, discuss issues of methodology and interpretation, and present a chronology of the fate of the ancient statues under examination. The papers that follow are divided into three topics. Part I, “Practices of Deposition and Reuse,” includes three papers; Part II, “Regional Perspectives,” includes seven; and Part III, “Grand Narratives,” contains four. As can be seen from this structure, the main emphasis has been given to the presentation of regional studies that give us an interesting insight into local practices at Sagalassos in Asia Minor, Athens, Corinth, Ostia, Roman Germany, Sicily, and on the Lower Danube. The editors’ introduction has a poignant subtitle, “From Use to Refuse,” that marks the multiple uses …

Polychromy in Africa Proconsularis: investigating Roman statues using X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy

Abstract

Identification by Raman microspectroscopy of pigments in seated statues found in the Torreparedones Roman archaeological site (Baena, Spain)

In this work, Raman microspectroscopy and optical microscopy were for the first time used to examine pigments in Roman statues. The pigments were present in three statues found in the Torreparedones archaeological site, which is located in Baena (southern Spain). The statues represented a female, and the emperors Claudius and Augustus, all seated. The pigments comprised different hues and intensities of yellow, red and blue. As revealed by the Raman spectra, all yellow and red hues were from goethite (α-FeOOH) and hematite (α-Fe2O3), respectively. Some pigments additionally contained compounds such as calcium carbonate and sulphate, which were used in ancient times to enhance some colour hues, and calcium phosphate, a white pigment known as “bone white” and also used since ancient times but never previously found in mixtures with red. The blue pigment was invariably Egyptian blue and occasionally mixed with hematite to obtain purple hues.

The Reuse of Classical Antiquity in the Palace of Madinat al-Zahraʾ and Its Role in the Construction of Caliphal Legitimacy

The appearance of a group of Roman statues and sarcophagi in different buildings of the palace of Madinat al-Zahra⁠ʾ founded by Caliph ʿAbd al-Rahman III (r. 912–61) raises several questions about the revival of classical antiquity promoted by the caliphal court of Cordoba in the tenth century. The pieces—reused as basins for water fountains—had hitherto been considered irrelevant to the architectural and historical study of the caliphal palace, even though their discovery and location in specific buildings of the complex are essential to understanding and determining the function of these spaces. In addition, this discovery will help to interpret the range of the cultural development of the caliphal court and its relevance in the construction of political theory in al-Andalus in the tenth century. In this article I first examine the intellectual context in which these pieces were displayed, which lets us understand the reasons these particular characters—heroes, philosophers, and Muses—and scenes were chosen. I also consider the relationship these pieces had with their designated locations and to what extent their existence might suggest that these were spaces related to scientific and intellectual activities.

Greek and Roman Statues in Late Antiquity: The Acceptance and Inheritance of Pagan Statuary in the Early Byzantine Era

Greek and Roman Statues in Late Antiquity: The Acceptance and Inheritance of Pagan Statuary in the Early Byzantine Era

The agency of Greek and Roman statues. From Homer to Constantine

In the Archaic period the Greeks did not yet conceptualize the difference between a divinity and its statue. Therefore, stories that stressed the agency of statues separate from their divinities must have seemed less strange at that time than when the statues had become independent, so to speak, from their gods or goddesses. The latter started to happen in the transitional period to the Classical era when the well-known triad of divinities—heroes—mortals came into being, and philosophers began to criticize the worship of statues. All these changes together led to a development in which the agency of statues increasingly became noteworthy. After the 5th century BC we keep hearing about the agency of statues but we can also notice a growing critique of the worship of statues by different philosophical schools. In both Greece and Rome divine statues manifested themselves in particular during moments of crisis or of a decisive political character. In the Greek East the belief in the agency of statues lasted until the 3rd century AD, as Archaic statues represented a kind of cultural capital for the Greeks under Roman rule. Yet, in the end the continuing philosophical critique, which had been radicalized by the Christians, made the agency of statues intellectually unacceptable.

Exhibiting the Past. Caspar J. C. Reuvens and the Museums of Antiquities in Europe 1800-1840

What ideas have guided the founders of museums of antiquities? Caspar Reuvens (1793–1835) may well be regarded as the founder of what is now the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden. As such he deserves a place among the better-known pioneers of its various counterparts in England, France, Italy, Germany, and many other budding nation-states at a time when each was seeking an identity of its own after a quarter-century of Europe-wide disruption. Extraordinarily well-placed inside the Dutch political and cultural élite, in 1818 the philologist Reuvens was, at the tender age of twenty-five, called to the first chair of archeology in existence in the Netherlands and (so the author claims) anywhere else in the world. The university that appointed him was that of Leyden. For already half a century it had been the not-so-proud owner of a collection of Greek and Roman statues, donated by a private collector. They were gathering moss in the shed-like orangery of the Leiden Hortus Botanicus, and indeed, more weighty reasons were involved in the Dutch king’s readiness to create the chair and appoint Reuvens to fill it. The king’s expectations had everything to do with his sudden elevation, due to the Congress of Vienna’s ordering of post-Napoleonic Europe, to the throne of both the Northern and the Southern Netherlands, so image-building and education figured high on his royal agenda.

The Poet as Translator: Mary Wortley Montagu Approaches the Turkish Lyric

The Poet as Translator: Mary Wortley Montagu Approaches the Turkish Lyric

Some Aspects of the Bioerosion of Stone Artefact Found Underwater: Significant Case Studies

Within the framework of the project Restoring Underwater started in 2001, the ISCR Marine Biology sector with the ISCR Underwater Archaeology Operation Unit has begun a study of the deterioration of stone artefacts exposed to marine environments (Torre Astura – Nettuno; Baiae – Naples). These studies have allowed to better understanding the factor of degradation by biological, mineralogical, and petrographic analyses and to develop measures for the protection in situ of cultural heritage. Based on what was recorded, usually the bioerosion presents various degrees of gravity: limited and sporadic damage or very serious alterations. Depending on their chemical composition, the artefacts proved to be particularly susceptible to the action of corrosion exercised by perforating animal and plant organisms.This phenomenon becomes more significant in the case in which the artefacts remain exposed and in the same position for a long period of time. It is possible to confirm that the combined action of attack from clionides (sponges) and bivalves can lead, over time, to the total destruction of portions of the artefact (macroboring). As well as these more macroscopic types of damage, there was evidence of the widespread presence of microscopic bioerosion (microboring), caused by autotrophic and heterotrophic microorganisms, visible only through SEM observations, which, despite not creating large chambers, progressively undermine the resistance of the stone and facilitate the development of other biodeteriogens. This paper will be focused on the characterization of the bioerosion observed on different artefacts: the roman statues discovered underwater in the Grotta Azzurra, Capri and in the Campi Flegrei area (Naples –Italy), and the marble sarcophagi that are still on the seabed of San Pietro in Bevagna (Taranto – Italy).

Sulfur determination on stone monuments with a transportable EDXRF system

AbstractAn important part of the world's cultural heritage is represented by stone monuments. A very dangerous weathering process that deteriorates stone monuments and is caused by human activity is air pollution. One of the worst pollutants for stone monuments is associated with sulfur compounds, especially with gypsum. Gypsum is a rather soluble compound that may be washed away by rain. It leaves the surface of the stone clean but eroded and open to new corrosive processes.With transportable energy dispersive x‐ray fluorescence (EDXRF) instruments it is possible to conduct in situ investigations, mappings, registrations and evaluations of the stone‐degradation phenomena related to sulfate formation on stone and stone‐like materials by quantifying sulfur concentrations directly associated with the presence of gypsum.The EDXRF instrument used in this project is a commercial system comprising a miniaturized low‐power, air‐cooled tungsten x‐ray tube and a silicon drift detector (SDD) Peltier‐cooled detector.The EDXRF instrument was calibrated using a series of standard samples specifically developed for this project with a sulfur content ranging from 0.5 to 15%. Correlating the sulfur peak counts with sulfur concentrations, a straight calibration line (R2 = 0.9985) was obtained. Several high voltage levels of the x‐ray tube were tried to define the best operating conditions. The silicon escape peak of calcium had to be accounted for owing to its interference with the sulfur peak.In this paper we shall discuss the working method adopted and the results achieved following the examination of a number of stone monuments such as the “Fanciulla di Anzio” and other ancient Roman statues housed in the Roman National Museum, and the Sarcophagus of Pope Boniface VIII sculpted by Arnolfo di Cambio and situated in the Crypt of the Vatican Basilica. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Estatuas y retratos imperiales en Hispania romana

Study of the diffusion of the Roman imperial portraits and statues in the I. Peninsula mainly based on the epigraphical evidence in different contexts, from Augustus to Theodosius. This method of analysis reveals more clearly than others the diffusion of the imperial image in coloniae, municipia or villae and the different types adopted for the representation of the Emperor and his family during the period of the Roman presence in the Spanish provinces.

Restorer and Collector: Notes on Eighteenth-Century Recreations of Roman Statues

Restorer and Collector: Notes on Eighteenth-Century Recreations of Roman Statues

A geophysical survey in the center of Rome

A geophysical survey was performed recently in the center of Rome to verify the presence of archaeological structures inside an ancient villa. A museum (to house a large private collection of Greek and Roman statues) with underground parking was proposed for an abandoned area of the park surrounding the villa.

The Athena Lemnia Reconsidered

Two virtually identical replicas of a standing Athena are in Dresden Museum. To these bodies Furtwingler joined an ill preserved marble head in Dresden and a plaster cast of a similar head in Bologna. This Athena type, helmetless and wearing a transverse aegis over a full peplos, was then published by Furtwangler as Athena Lemnia by Pheidias. His conclusions concerning identification of Dresden replicas have been almost universally accepted and, accordingly, head type has been considered to represent a true copy of a fifth century original. Autopsy of replicas in Dresden and a re-evaluation of physical and literary evidence concerning Athena Lemnia show that type as created by Furtwangler must be reconsidered. literary testimonia for a helmetless Athena Lemnia are ambiguous and it can be shown that Bologna head does not fit within cavity of Dresden Athena, as Furtwangler believed. This article submits that head type is not a copy of an original fifth century work, but is, instead, a classicizing creation of Roman period. If, indeed, Bologna head is a Roman creation, stylistic criteria used for determining fifth century head types on basis of Roman copies must be re-evaluated. Whether Dresden body is a replica of Lemnia cannot be determined, nor can an appropriate alternative type be recognized. THE PHYSICAL EVIDENCE Between 1891 and 1893 Furtwangler joined an ill preserved marble head and a plaster cast of another marble head in Bologna to two identical torsos of Athena in Dresden, and published his opinions concerning them in his monumental and influential Meisterwerke der griechischen Plastik.' Because of literary testimonia as well as a representation on a gem, he described statues as exact copies of Lemnian Athena by and thus began a new phase in study of Lemnia in particular and Pheidian style in general.2 two Roman statues in Albertinum in Dresden which Furtwangler employed for his reconstruction are virtually identical replicas of a standing Athena wearing peplos and aegis. When they arrived in Dresden in 1728 from Chigi collection in Rome, dissimilar heads had already been placed on both statues, although neither necessarily belonged (pl. 42, figs. 1, 2). head that was joined to Replica B obviously did not belong with this statue and was removed.3 head joined to Replica A, inaccurately restored with a helmet to cover missing crown, was discovered to be a copy of a beautiful marble head in Bologna-the so-called Palagi head (cf. pl. 42, figs. 3, 4).4 Palagi head had been previously published as that of a young man or an Amazon.s Accordingly, Dresden head was considered inappropriate for Athena body and was removed. crown, nose and mouth were restored in plaster using Palagi head as model and head was displayed separately. After a lengthy study of possible head types suitable for such a body, Furtwangler thought that this removed head indeed fitted and had not been an inappropriate modern addition. In fact, the two fitted * This article is based on my master's thesis, The Athena Lemnia Reconsidered: Dresden Replicas and Bologna Head, submitted to Bryn Mawr College in 1981. A version of this paper was presented at University of Hartford on November 20, 1980, and at 1982 Annual Meeting of College Art Association in New York City. I wish to thank Herr M. Raumschiissel for permission to study and photograph replicas in Albertinum Museum, Dresden. For her constant guidance and criticism, I am indebted to Professor B.S. Ridgway. ' A. Furtwangler, Meisterwerke der griechischen Plastik (Leipzig-Berlin 1893) 3-45 and Masterpieces of Greek Sculpture (London 1895) 3-26 (henceforth Meisterwerke and Masterpieces, respectively). Several other publications concerning Athena Lemnia may be considered basic: M. Bieber, antiken Skulpturen und Bronzen des Kiniglichen Museum Fridericianum in Cassel (Marburg 1915) 5-8; RE 12 B (1925) 1897-1927, s.v. Lemnia (H. Lamer); BrBr 793 and 794, text by W. Muiller (Munich 1947); G. Gualandi, L'Athena Lemnia e il momento classico nella collezione Palagi, II Carrobbio 2 (1976) 205-24. article by A. Linfert, Athenen des Pheidias, AthMitt 97 (1982) 57-77, in which Lemnia is discussed (esp. pp. 59-66), appeared too late to be taken into account. 2 Furtwangler was not first to associate Dresden replicas with a possible Lemnia type. See O. Puchstein, Die Parthenonsculpturen, JdI 5 (1890) 94-95, figs. 5a, 6a. 3 For convenience two statues in Dresden will be referred to as Replica A and Replica B. 4 According to G. Treu, Director of Albertinum, Flasch was first to recognize this similarity (see Furtwangler, Meisterwerke 5, n. 4). sA young man: A. Conze, Antikensammlungen in Oberitalien, AZ 25 (1867) 90. An Amazon: E. Brizio, Resoconto delle Adunanze dell'Instituto, BdI 1872, 66.

Spenser's Hermaphrodite and the 1590 Faerie Queene

The image of the Hermaphrodite with which Spenser presents the union of Amoret and Scudamour in his original conclusion to Book IIIof The Faerie Queene draws on two distinct iconographic traditions: the Ovidian scene of Hermaphroditus and Salmacis which had become a symbol of marriage in Renaissance emblem books, and the single androgynous figure found in antique Roman statues which bear an uncertain relationship to Platonic notions of perfection. Such a conflation enables Spenser to emphasize and complete patterns of imagery which he has been developing throughout Book III: Britomart as patroness of Chastity has assumed an Amazonian role which stresses her androgynous self-sufficiency, but she has been repeatedly shown as tormented by visions of love. Like Guyon in Hook II, she fulfills her immediate quest when she liberates a victim of enchantment; but although she differs from Guyon in her destined participation in British history, she remains aware that within the context of the Book of Chastity she can be wholly chaste only at the price of her continuing incompleteness as a woman. Spenser's poem in its three-book form shares with other Elizabethan works a preoccupation with the paradoxical identification of love and death, a recognition that the self can triumph over change only by accepting its own destruction in marriage.

De italiska folkens förhållande till den grekiska konsten

Summary Every scholar who—however slightly—has come to touch upon problems of Roman art is well aware that the most crucial of them all is the intricate question of the extent of the Greek influence that is undeniably present in all products of Roman art. It is one of those problems which are easy to state but extremely hard to solve. Horace's famous words about Greece that captured her ferocious captor and introduced the arts in Latium1 like most famous quotations from world literature are more striking than realistic. We may admit that they are mainly true for his own sphere of art, i.e. literature, but the decorative and figurative arts in Italy and Rome had a far more remote history which decided the course of development of what is commonly called Roman art. The First Contact. Towards the end of the Mycenean age Sicily and South Italy seem to have entertained close commercial relations with Mycenean Greece. With trade went art. Mycenean vases were imported and imitated, as is shown by the finds made ...

Roman Sculptures from Colonia Caesarea (Pisidian Antioch)

NO sculptures have yet been found by the University of Michigan expedition2 at Antioch-towards-Pisidia which can be definitely described as original Greek works; but the Greek influence of the fifth century can be seen in at least two male Roman figures and in the statue of Victory.3 Only a few Roman statues or parts of statues in the round were unearthed and some of these show the influence of Pergamum. This influence is also conspicuous in the reliefs which represent the captive Pisidian chiefs and especially in the armor designs. The idealistic sculpture of the Greek classical period was concerned mainly with the glorification of gods and heroes and with the portrayal of victory under the guise of myth and allegory. It was not till after the conquest of Alexander4 that sculpture rendered in realistic detail not only the violence and confusion of battle but also the spoils of marine and military warfare, as in the decorative units on the balustrade of the stoa of the precinct of Athena Polias at Pergamu...