Commentary Prepared by Dr. Julia Lenaghan, Ashmolean Museum

C 057
Head Based Loosely on Polykleitos’ Diadoumenos. Set on Statue of Penelope. Vatican

Marble
Head

In the Vatican collection, so undoubtedly from Italy.
Italy, Vatican, Galleria delle Statue, 261 (inv.754)

Preservation:
The nose and part of the upper lip are restored. The face has been worked over.

Description:
The head depicts a long haired youth who wears a broad fillet around his head. The youth has a thin oval face which ends in a “U”-shaped chin. The smooth rectangular brow is framed above by the horizontal edge of the fillet and below by arcing eyebrows which are sharply defined. The eyes are oval and have a projecting upper eyelid. Below the lower eyelid the flesh is softly modeled. The mouth is small from side to side and has a full lower lip under which there is a small indentation before the projection of the chin. Above the broad fillet, which is about five centimeters wide, the hair appears to have a central part. Below the fillet the hair falls in long full locks between the corner of the eye and the ear. On the left side, exactly four locks are visible in this area. Falling down over the corner of the eye is a large heavy lock which neither curls nor hangs straight. Behind it, closer to the ear, is a longer more wavy lock which ends in a tight curl. Behind that is a third lock which has the same shape as the second lock but is shorter. The final lock in front of the ear is the longest. It too is wavy and curls into itself at its end. The locks of the right side are not visible because of the head’s insertion into the hood of the mantle.

Discussion:
The head has been attached to a seated statue of Penelope to which it does not belong. It is a male head and follows a general format which is known in three tightly related examples; a head in the Museo Nazionale Romano (inv.579); a head in the Liverpool Museum (formerly Ince Blundell Hall); and a head in a private collection in Boston (CritArt 11-12 1937 pl.148). Other more loosely related heads are in the Bunnemann collection in Munich, in Budapest, in the British Museum, and in the Louvre. All of these heads, made in the Roman period, are considered to have been inspired by the popular “Diadoumenos” of Polykleitos. They are not copies of the “Diadoumenos” but are adaptions, almost new creations, based upon it. For instance, the Vatican head and the three heads to which it is most closely related combine the pattern of the “Diadoumenos” head with severe style hairdo. The manufacture of the Vatican head has been placed by Zanker in the Julio-Claudian period and by the Fuhrer to the Hadrianic period. Kriekenbom calls it “early imperial.” The reworking of the surface makes it difficult to date.

Bibliography:
W. Amelung, Die Skulpturen des vaticanischen Museums I (Berlin 1903) pp.439-440 no.261 catalogue entry
W. Helbig (H. von Steuben), Führer durch die öffentlichen Sammlungen klassicher Altertumer in Rom I(4th ed) (Tübingen 1963) p.89 no.123 considers head to be Hadrianic, based on work of second half fifth century BC
P. Zanker, Klassizistische Statuen (Mainz 1974) p.17 pl.15.1 dates to the Tiberian-Claudian period, evidence of the popularity of Polykleitos’ Diadoumenos
D. Kreikenbom, Bildwerke nach Polyklet (Berlin 1990) pp.137-138, 202 V 56 pl.344a early imperial, compares with head in private collection in Boston
, Museo Nazionale Romano: Le sculture I, 12.1 (Rome 1995) p. 38 under S 46 (inv.579) similar to head in the Museo Nazionale Romano