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Lot Essay
Mistakenly identified as female when it was first sold in 1929, this sculpture instead depicts Apollo and has since been believed to be a version of the Apollo Palatinus. The now-lost original sculpture, thought to have been made by Skopas in the 4th century B.C., once stood in the Augustan Temple of Apollo on the Palatine hill.
Apollo Palatinus wears a mantel around his back and a folded peplos, originally the identifying garment of Athena but adopted for Apollo in the 4th century B.C. The god's hair was likely bound and he would probably have been carrying a kithara.
In a poem celebrating the dedication of the Temple of Apollo, the Roman poet Prospertius (d. 15 B.C.) wrote of the statues displayed there, “Then between his mother and his sister the god of Pytho himself, wearing a long cloak, plays and sings” (II.31.15-16). The Apollonian triad, showing Apollo together with his mother Leto and sister Diana, was popular in the early Imperial era after falling out of fashion in the Hellenistic period. This particular variation on the motif, most famously appears in the 1st century B.C. statue base relief, now in the Museo Correale in Sorrento.
The Apollo depicted on the Sorrento base was considered a small-scale copy of the cult statue immortalized by Prospertius. Using the Sorrento base as an archetype, scholars soon began identifying other copies of the Apollo Palatinus, including examples in the Museo Civico, Catania; the Fattoria Corsini, Todi; the Palazzo Corsini, Florence; and in the Palazzo Borghese, Rome. When the statue presented here was first recognized in 1967, it was praised for its “great awareness” and “strong monumentality” and was considered unique for the particular folds of the drapery and for the way the peplos lies taught against the right leg.
While modern scholarship now debates whether the type is Apollo Palatinus or perhaps another similar statue from the Palatine, the Apollo Augustus, they all agree that the statue presented here is the god Apollo. For the best representation of how the complete statue originally appeared, see the coin from the reign of Antoninus Pius, below.
Apollo Palatinus wears a mantel around his back and a folded peplos, originally the identifying garment of Athena but adopted for Apollo in the 4th century B.C. The god's hair was likely bound and he would probably have been carrying a kithara.
In a poem celebrating the dedication of the Temple of Apollo, the Roman poet Prospertius (d. 15 B.C.) wrote of the statues displayed there, “Then between his mother and his sister the god of Pytho himself, wearing a long cloak, plays and sings” (II.31.15-16). The Apollonian triad, showing Apollo together with his mother Leto and sister Diana, was popular in the early Imperial era after falling out of fashion in the Hellenistic period. This particular variation on the motif, most famously appears in the 1st century B.C. statue base relief, now in the Museo Correale in Sorrento.
The Apollo depicted on the Sorrento base was considered a small-scale copy of the cult statue immortalized by Prospertius. Using the Sorrento base as an archetype, scholars soon began identifying other copies of the Apollo Palatinus, including examples in the Museo Civico, Catania; the Fattoria Corsini, Todi; the Palazzo Corsini, Florence; and in the Palazzo Borghese, Rome. When the statue presented here was first recognized in 1967, it was praised for its “great awareness” and “strong monumentality” and was considered unique for the particular folds of the drapery and for the way the peplos lies taught against the right leg.
While modern scholarship now debates whether the type is Apollo Palatinus or perhaps another similar statue from the Palatine, the Apollo Augustus, they all agree that the statue presented here is the god Apollo. For the best representation of how the complete statue originally appeared, see the coin from the reign of Antoninus Pius, below.