CIRCA 1ST-2ND CENTURY A.D.

Of this figure, K.A. Mortier and C.C. Vermeule (op. cit.) write, “Equally fascinating in these respects is the Statue of a Seated Lady…represented as a priestess or attendant of a major Roman goddess such as Cybele and her cults near Rome. Older priestesses of this great Asiatic mother-goddess usually wore a mural crown, since Cybele was the patroness of many cities, but here the elegant young lady may have held a relatively minor position in Rome’s urban cults of the goddess, whose temple was near the house of Augustus and Livia on the Palatine Hill. Here not only her pose but also drapery are based on a famous statue from the atelier of the family of Polykleitos, the cult-image of Hera created around 400 B.C. for the temple in the uplands a short distance from the city of Argos. [This] statue…has preserved an especially skillful handling of the drapery, in itself a visual pleasure as well as an expression of the majesty of the larger-scale original in the famous shrine and temple of the Peloponnesus. In addition, the Graeco-Roman sculptor gave the young lady an elegant chair in the Greek tradition of the fourth century B.C. and embellished it with figures of priests of Cybele and her attendant Attis in low relief on the sides.”

For other depictions of seated women, see figs. 451-455 and 456-458 in M. Bieber Ancient Copies: Contributions to the History of Greek and Roman Art. Also compare the seated woman in the Art Institute of Chicago, who is similarly not centered on her chair (inv. no. 1986.1060, see no 12 in K.A. Raff Roman Art at the Art Institute of Chicago).