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Lot Essay
Despite the centuries-long notion that the ancient world was fashioned only of gleaming white marble, it is now recognized that the Greeks and Romans applied bright pigments to their statues and buildings. In addition to painted stones, the use of naturally occurring colored marble also became popular, begining with the reign of Augustus (27 B.C.-14 A.D.), Rome’s first Emperor, and continuing throughout the Imperial Period. The unusual statue presented here is sculpted from two very distinct colored marbles: pavonazzetto and giallo antico. The first, with its stunning purple to grey veining against a white background, was quarried in Docimium in Asia Minor. The second, typically dark yellow, sometimes with pink or red veining, was quarried in the hills surrounding ancient Simitthus in Tunisia (see see M.L. Anderson and L. Nista, eds., Radiance in Stone, Sculptures in Colored Marbles from the Museo Nazionale Romano, pp. 73, 93).
This statue is in the form of an archaistic kore, or maiden, loosely inspired by Greek prototypes of the late Archaic and early Classical periods. She stands frontally, wearing an ankle-length peplos with a long overfold, the U-shaped and zigzag folds symmetrically arranged. Her arms fall along her sides with her hands pulling outwards on the edges of the skirt at her hips. The separately-made head is inserted into a concavity between the shoulders. She has centrally-parted hair bound in a diadem, with strands rolled back from the forehead over her ears, and long braids falling along her neck.
The present example originally must have served as a caryatid, perhaps supporting a table, either singly or as a pair. The top of her head was likely re-worked in the 18th or 19th century in order to remove the remains of a pilaster, and the feet were restored from a different block of pavonazzetto. The material and quality of the sculpture suggest that it originated from Pompeii or another provincial workshop. For a related caryatid in pavonazzetto, which does not preserve its head, see the example from Tarragona, now in the Museo Archeologico, fig. 16 in M. De Nuccio and L. Ungaro, I marmi colorati della Roma imperial.
This statue is in the form of an archaistic kore, or maiden, loosely inspired by Greek prototypes of the late Archaic and early Classical periods. She stands frontally, wearing an ankle-length peplos with a long overfold, the U-shaped and zigzag folds symmetrically arranged. Her arms fall along her sides with her hands pulling outwards on the edges of the skirt at her hips. The separately-made head is inserted into a concavity between the shoulders. She has centrally-parted hair bound in a diadem, with strands rolled back from the forehead over her ears, and long braids falling along her neck.
The present example originally must have served as a caryatid, perhaps supporting a table, either singly or as a pair. The top of her head was likely re-worked in the 18th or 19th century in order to remove the remains of a pilaster, and the feet were restored from a different block of pavonazzetto. The material and quality of the sculpture suggest that it originated from Pompeii or another provincial workshop. For a related caryatid in pavonazzetto, which does not preserve its head, see the example from Tarragona, now in the Museo Archeologico, fig. 16 in M. De Nuccio and L. Ungaro, I marmi colorati della Roma imperial.