Sunday, January 31, 2010

The Young Bithynian


"Antinoüs was the last sculptural type of male beauty to have been invented in the classical world – lush, melancholy and demure." Hadrian and the Triumph of Rome / Anthony Everitt


















He lived from 29 November 111 to 30 October 130. After his death (by drowning, at age eighteen, in the Nile, under mysterious circumstances) Antinoüs was declared a god by his good friend the Emperor Hadrian. How short the life. How numerous the statues.

Images here.