Skip to main content
Bonhams
Search

This auction has ended. View lot details

You may also be interested in

An Anatolian marble idol
A Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone with dedication inscription of King Lipit-Ishtar of Isin

Own a similar item?

Submit your item online for a free auction estimate.

A small Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone inscribed for King Sin-Kashid of Uruk
A Neo-Assyrian or Neo-Hittite bronze helmet with pelta-shaped cheek-pieces
A Babylonian agate "eye-stone" bead, inscribed for Nebuchadnezzar II
A large Etruscan Impasto Ware pottery olla
A Roman marble torso of a youth wearing a tunic
A Roman marble head of a satyr
An Attic pottery tankard with geometric decoration
A Greek bronze horse
A Greek pottery alabastron in the form of a greaved leg
A Greek green glazed faience hedgehog aryballos
A Greek bronze hydria with siren handle-plate
A Greek terracotta figure of a woman
A Greek terracotta female figure with a bird perched on her shoulder
An Etruscan terracotta antefix of a satyr
An Etruscan bronze woman possibly dancing
An Etruscan bronze candelabrum
An Etruscan terracotta votive life-size left leg
An Attic black-figure Little Master band-cup with grazing deer and panther
An Attic black-figure eye-cup with gorgoneion tondo
An Attic red-figure trefoil lipped oinochoe
An Attic black-figure lekythos
A European bronze dirk blade
Previous Lot
Next Lot
Lot 134

A Roman marble male torso

Antiquities
3 July 2019, 10:00 BST
London, New Bond Street

Sold for £62,562.50 inc. premium

Own a similar item?

Submit your item online for a free auction estimate.

How to sell

Looking for a similar item?

Our Antiquities specialists can help you find a similar item at an auction or via a private sale.

Find your local specialist

Ask about this lot

A Roman marble male torso
Circa 1st Century A.D.
The youthful figure standing in contrapposto, with the weight on his right leg, his left shoulder slightly raised, depicted nude, of athletic form, the muscular torso with well-pectorals, abdominal muscles and iliac crests, with rounded buttocks and muscular back, the dorsal muscles emphasised by a sunken depression along the spine, 40cm high

Footnotes

Provenance:
with Maxburg Galerie Antiken, Munich.
Professor Wilhelm Kreutzberg (1932-2019) collection, Munich, acquired from the above in April 1976.

Based on the rendering of the abdominal musculature, which is comparable to Greek statuary types of c. 450-420 B.C. (cf. Polykleitos' Diadoumenos), the present torso is likely a Roman copy of a Greek original from the 5th Century B.C. The modelling of the body is in the Polykleitan style, in particular in its use of chiasmos. The Romans developed a great interest in Polykleitos' work during the 1st and 2nd Centuries A.D., frequently emulating his style. This preoccupation with his work is demonstrated by Pliny the Elder's description of Polykleitos as 'having attained the highest excellence in statuary' (Pliny, NH 34.19).

For a similarly modelled torso, see C. Vermeule, Greek and Roman Sculpture in America, California, 1981, no. 26.

Additional information

Bid now on these items

An Anatolian marble idol
A Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone with dedication inscription of King Lipit-Ishtar of Isin
A small Mesopotamian clay cuneiform foundation cone inscribed for King Sin-Kashid of Uruk
A Neo-Assyrian or Neo-Hittite bronze helmet with pelta-shaped cheek-pieces
A Babylonian agate "eye-stone" bead, inscribed for Nebuchadnezzar II
A large Etruscan Impasto Ware pottery olla
A Roman marble torso of a youth wearing a tunic
A Roman marble head of a satyr
An Attic pottery tankard with geometric decoration
A Greek bronze horse
A Greek pottery alabastron in the form of a greaved leg
A Greek green glazed faience hedgehog aryballos
A Greek bronze hydria with siren handle-plate
A Greek terracotta figure of a woman
A Greek terracotta female figure with a bird perched on her shoulder
An Etruscan terracotta antefix of a satyr
An Etruscan bronze woman possibly dancing
An Etruscan bronze candelabrum
An Etruscan terracotta votive life-size left leg
An Attic black-figure Little Master band-cup with grazing deer and panther
An Attic black-figure eye-cup with gorgoneion tondo
An Attic red-figure trefoil lipped oinochoe
An Attic black-figure lekythos
A European bronze dirk blade