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Identification and Creation

Object Number
1920.44.206
Title
Lower Half of a Statuette of Aphrodite
Classification
Sculpture
Work Type
statuette, sculpture
Date
133-31 BCE
Period
Hellenistic period, Late
Culture
Greek
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/292320

Physical Descriptions

Medium
Marble from Greek island
Dimensions
12.5 cm (4 15/16 in.)

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Miss Elizabeth Gaskell Norton, Boston, MA and Miss Margaret Norton, Cambridge, MA (by 1920), gift; to the Fogg Museum, 1920.

Note: The Misses Norton were daughters of Charles Elliot Norton (1827-1908).

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Gift of the Misses Norton
Accession Year
1920
Object Number
1920.44.206
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
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Descriptions

Published Catalogue Text: Stone Sculptures: The Greek, Roman and Etruscan Collections of the Harvard University Art Museums , written 1990
78

Lower Half of a Statuette of Aphrodite

The figure is broken off irregularly on a line through the chest. The hands and plinth are also damaged. The carving is sketchy and slightly cursory but not unfinished.

Aphrodite, or possibly a nymph, is represented standing holding the edge of her cloak with her lowered right hand. The other end of the cloak went up around her left shoulder or arm and fell down in zigzag folds along her left side.

An analogous statuette in Boston, also a gift of the Misses Sara and Elizabeth Gaskell Norton, was found on Cyprus in 1870 and is from the same type of marble (Comstock, Vermeule, 1976, p. 115, no. 176). Another variation on this theme showed Aphrodite with the drapery (himation) grasped in her left hand, a chiton covering her upper body and arms, and a small Eros perched on her left shoulder (Sotheby Parke Bernet Sale No. 4869Y, New York, 20 May, 1982, no. 145).

Cornelius Vermeule and Amy Brauer

Publication History

  • Cornelius C. Vermeule III and Amy Brauer, Stone Sculptures: The Greek, Roman and Etruscan Collections of the Harvard University Art Museums, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1990), p. 92, no. 78

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu