Commentary Prepared by Dr. Julia Lenaghan, Ashmolean Museum
C 062
Hestia Giustiniani. Villa Albani, Rome
Marble
Statue
1.93 m (without plinth)
From Italy. The statue has previously been in the Museo Torlonia and the Giustiniani collection.
Italy, Rome, Villa Albani
Preservation:Restorations include the border edge of the shawl, the end of the nose, the little finger of the right hand, two fingers and the end of the thumb of the left hand. The right forearm is broken. The surface of thestatue has been so severely cleaned that the sharpness of the modelling of the folds has been damaged.
Description:The statue depicts a woman who wears an “Argive” peplos with a small shawl over the head. The upper area of the peplos is folded down with the result that the crease of the fold becomes the top edge. The top edges, pulled up from the back and the front, are fastened at the shoulders. The viewer, thus, sees, the folded area or apoptygma, the edge of which crosses the body horizontally at the waist. Because the width of the peplos is greater than the width of the body, the material of apoptygma bunches together on the sides of the body where it hangs down further. This is particularly visible at the back where its edge is only briefly horizontal. The frontal area of the apoptygma is a marked by two slightly arching parallel folds which run between the nipples and between the shoulders.
Below the apoptygma appears another slim band of material. This is the kolpos or material which has bloused out and over a belt near the waist which is concealed by the apoptygma. Below the belt, the kolpos and the apoptygma, the peplos falls in large straight folds which end a few centimeters above the ground. The peplos is not open on the side which means that the two lateral edges of the cloth have been sewn together.
Over the head is a short mantle which covers the shoulders. At the front of the body its bottom border extends down below the armpits. At the back of the body the bottom border roughly follows a line that is parallel to the bottom edge of the apoptygma; it is longer on the sides where it hangs down below the shoulder blades and at the center rises up to the neck.
The statue stands with the left foot pulled back. Although the thick folds of the peplos’ skirt do not reveal the position of the legs in frontal view, the heel of the left foot can be seen emerging from the back bottom edge of the peplos and the vertical folds are disrupted from the back of the left knee downwards. The right upper arm is lowered and moves to the side. The right forearm, forming a 90 degree angle with the upper arm, extends to the side of the body. The back of the of the right hand rests at the waist on the right side of the body. The left upper is also lowered and moves to its left. The forearm, however, is raised. The left hand probably held a staff. The head turns to the right.
The head covered by the mantle features locks of hair that are cut around the face. The locks, are thick and fall without a part from the crown of the head. At their ends they curl slightly; over the left eye the ends curl in different direction and thus, disturb the uniform path over the brow. The locks extend to the level of the eyebrows, which they in part conceal, and, covering the ears, they continue around the face. On the sides of the neck the locks are longer and feature corkscrew curls.
The face has long oval shape and appears to be narrow. The cheekbones are high and the cheeks are flat and smooth. The brow appears to be tall but is mainly covered by the bangs of hair. The eyes are neither small nor remarkably wide. The bottom lid as an almost horizontal path and the upper lid is thick and projects. The corners of the full mouth turn slightly downwards; the upper lip has a central dip. The chin is solid and “U” shaped.
Discussion:The Villa Albani, formerly Torlonia and before that Giustiniani, statue is the best preserved example of a type which, named after it, is called the "Hestia Giustiniani". There are two other full sized torsos, one from Ephesos (the gymnasium of Vedius) and one from Rome now in the Capitoline collection, as well as small-scale torso in the Torlonia collection that follow the type. In addition, there are two recorded copies of the head the whereabouts of both of these is no longer now; they were formerly in a private collection in Berlin and in the Palazzo Lancellotti in Naples.
Tolle-Kastenbein considers the Albani statue to be Claudian on account of the corkscrew locks along the side of the neck. She also believes that the head of the Albani statue less reliable as a copy than head in Berlin (which incidentally she believes belongs to the Ephesos torso) both because of the corkscrew curls and because of the disruption or parting of the locks over the left eye. She believes that is not an early classical tendency. Yet, it should be pointed out that these locks with ends that move in opposite directions appear on the bangs of the Choisseul-Gouffier-Omphalos Apollo (see cat. C 13). Nor are corkscrew locks impossible in an early classical work.
The statue certainly displays the characteristics of the “Severe” style and has been dated by all scholars between 470 BC and 450 BC. The head type has been compared to that of the “Blonde Boy” and perhaps more significantly to that of the Choisseul-Gouffier-Omphalos Apollo type (see cat. C 13) with which it has many similarities. These include the hair bangs, the shape of the face, the chin, the eyes, and the lips. Robertson probably correctly suggests that the Omphalos Apollo, the Artemision Zeus, and the “Hestia Giustiniani” were produced by the same artistic “school” and perhaps even by the same workshop.
The body of the statue is clearly contemporary with that of the Ludovisi-Candia type (see cat. C 60) and the pelophoroi of the pediments of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia. The lower area of the statue, its rigid and concealing “skirt”, has been continually compared to the lower area of the Delphi Charioteer. The bottom half of the Delphi Charioteer also features thick vertical folds that have a shape which is entirely independent of the anatomy underneath it. Both the Temple of Zeus at Olympia and the Delphi Charioteer are monuments with relatively fixed chronological dates.
Although the statue is called Hestia, the original subject really remains unknown. The name Hestia derived from a seated veiled figure entitled Hestia on a red figure cup in Berlin (Staatl.Mus. F2278). The subject, however, is more likely to have been Hera or Demeter given the significant details of the shawl-like mantle and the staff (the presence of which is securely ascertained by traces on the plinth of the Ephesos torso.) Tolle-Kastenbein leans toward the Hera identification and cites the passage in the Iliad in which Hera, preparing herself for the seduction of Zeus, puts on a mantle (Iliad 14.175-178, 184-185). Moreover, she notes the similar manner of dress of Hera on a metope from the Temple of Hera in Selinunte that depicts Zeus and Hera in sacred marriage (hieros gamos).
E. Harrison in her lecture classes points out that, in addition to the scepter and general dignity of the statue, the Argive peplos also suggests that the subject is Hera. The peplos is after all called Argive because of its repeated occurrence in Argos and Argos was the most famous cult center dedicated to Hera. Harrison also notes three further details 1) the veil is appropriate for a bride, 2) that the columnar lower section of the statue recalls that of the Charioteer, and 3) that Ageladas was known to have made a statue of the young Jupiter. Harrison, therefore, proposes that we imagine that the Albani statue formed part of a group which depicted the young Jupiter with his new bride Hera riding off in a chariot.
Bibliography:C.L. Visconti,
I monumenti del Museo Torlonia di sculture antiche (Rome 1884) no.490
W. Helbig (H. von Steuben),
Führer durch die öffentlichen Sammlungen klassischer Altertumer in Rom II (4th edition) (Tübingen 1966) pp.545-546 no.1772
original statue dates ca.470 and represented Hera or DemeterB. S. Ridgway,
The Severe Style in Greek Sculpture (Princeton 1970) pp.64-65
original type dated ca.470, could be Demeter, Hera, or HestiaM. Robertson,
A History of Greek Art (Cambridge 1975) pp.191-92, 197
statue similar to Choisseul Gouffier-Omphalos Apollo, all probably from the same school and possibly same studioR. Tölle-Kastenbein,
"Fruhklassische Peplosfiguren. Typen und Repliken" (AntPl 20 1986) p.33 no.51a, pp.34-41
dates the Villa Albani statue to the Julio-Claudian period and the original statue to 470-460 BC, considers it probably to have represented Hera
