CIRCA LATE 1ST CENTURY B.C.-EARLY 1ST CENTURY A.D.

Dancing satyrs were very popular on Roman gems, the subject ultimately derived from a lost Greek original statue perhaps to be associated with the 4th century B.C. sculptor Praxiteles. A bronze statue of a dancing satyr in this same pose was discovered off the coast of Mazara del Vallo in Sicily in 1998 (see no. 28 in Ekserdjian and Treves, Bronze). Similar satyrs are also found on relief sculpture, together with Bacchus and other followers of the god (see for example the Borghese Vase, now in the Louvre, fig. 166 in Haskell and Penny, Taste and the Antique). On gems the subject was already popular in the late Hellenistic period (see nos. 431-448 in Plantzos, Hellenistic Engraved Gems). For related Roman gems see for example a carnelian in Lisbon, no. 29 in Spier, A Catalogue of the Calouste Gulbenkian Collection of Gems, and another in St. Petersburg, no. 80 in Neverov, Antique Intaglios in the Hermitage Collection.