Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Ancient Roman Marbles Surviving in Modern Rome

Roman Empire
Marsyas and Apollo among the Muses
1st-2nd century AD
marble sarcophagus
Galleria Doria Pamphilij, Rome

Roman Empire
Satyr
2nd century AD
marble statue (detail)
Galleria Borghese, Rome

Roman Empire
Achilles mourning the Death of Patroclus
AD 160
marble sarcophagus (detail)
Museo Archeologico Ostiense, Rome

Roman Empire
Achilles mourning the Death of Patroclus
AD 160
marble sarcophagus (detail)
Museo Archeologico Ostiense, Rome

Roman Empire
Aphrodite
1st century AD
marble statue
Antiquarium del Palatino, Rome

Roman Empire
Perseus with the Head of Medusa
late 1st-early 2nd century AD
marble statue (detail)
Museo Archeologico Ostiense, Rome

Roman Empire
Father and Daughter
AD 130-140
marble statue group
(heads and bodies assembled from non-matching sculptures)
Galleria Borghese, Rome

Mr. Extinction, Meet Ms. Survival

They're always whispering:
missing buttons, crow's-feet,
rust –
and I try to ignore them at first,
but they keep it up:
half-soles, dry rot,
biopsies, Studebakers –
that does it,
and I have to yell back:
virgin wool! fresh coffee! tennis balls!
new pennies! robins!
and that holds them a while,
but they always come again,
sometimes at night, sometimes
in crowded elevators: loose shingles,
they whine, soil erosion, migraines,
dented fenders. I hold my ears
and shout: high tide! fresh bread!
new shoes! oranges! and people around me nod
and straighten their shoulders and smile,
and I think for a moment I've won –
but of course you never win,
and it gets to be almost a game:
they give me oil spills,
sewage sludge, tobacco smoke;
I come back with swimming pools,
butterflies, cornfields!
They give me Calcutta,
Gary, Coney Island;
I rattle off Windermere, 
Isfahan, Bloomington – but
by the time I'm at work
it gets serious, all
lapsed memberships and auto graveyards
and partial dentures and sub-
committees and leaves in the eaves,
and right there at my desk I bellow:
daffodils! and sailboats! and Burgundy!
and limestone! and birch trees! and robins,
damn it, robins! and my boss
pats me on the shoulder, and my secretary
takes it in shorthand, and everywhere
efficiency doubles, I'm doing it, after all,
for them. And yet,
deep down, I know, in fact,
it's no more daffodils than it's half-soles –
what it really is,
is morning without a hangover
but a fifty percent chance of rain,
it's a cost-of-living raise
and a slight case of heartburn; well,
we all know about
the slow leak, the scratch
on our favorite record,
the 7:12 forty minutes late, sure –
but passenger pigeons? Studebakers? That's
going too far,
we have our pride, our good
intentions, our metabolism, we won't
be shunted off with clipper ships
and whooping cranes, we're going
to hang in there, all of us, because
the robins may be showing wear,
but still, by god,
they are robins.

– Philip Appleman (1978)

Roman Empire
Head of a Goddess
1st-2nd century AD
marble
Museo Barracco di Scultura Antica, Rome

Roman Empire
Colossal Bust of Augustus as Alexander the Great
early 1st century AD
marble
Aurelian Wall, Via Campania, Rome

Roman Empire
Colossal Male Head
2nd century AD
marble
Castel Sant' Angelo, Rome

Roman Empire
Colossal Male Head
2nd century AD
marble
Castel Sant' Angelo, Rome

Roman Empire
Head of Apollo
2nd-3rd century AD
marble
Museo Barracco di Scultura Antica, Rome

Roman Empire
Cult Statue, possibly Asclepius
2nd century AD
marble statue (fragment)
Museo Archeologico Ostiense, Rome

Roman Empire
Lion Hunt
AD 220-230
marble sarcophagus (detail)
Palazzo Mattei, Rome

Roman Empire
Horse Tamer
(one of the Dioscuri di Montecavallo)
1st century AD
colossal marble statue group
Quirinal Hill, Rome