A Marble Dionysiac Sarcophagus Relief , Roman Imperial, Severan, circa A.D. 200-225

probably Church of SS. Cosma e Damiano, Rome, circa mid 16th Century
Cardinal Scipio Borghese (1576-1633), Villa Taverna-Borghese, Frascati, early 17th Century
Émile Zola (1840-1902), Paris, acquired by him in Rome in 1894 (Hôtel Drouot, Paris, Catalogue des objets d'art et d'ameublement, faïences et porcelaines, bois sculptés, marbres, vitraux, sièges et meubles, anciennes tapisseries, tableaux anciens et modernes, aquarelles, dessins, gravures, livres, manuscrit... le tout dépendant de la succession de M. Emile Zola, March 9th-13th, 1903, lot 465)
probably the actress Cécile Sorel (1873-1966), Paris
Paul-Louis Weiller (1893-1993), Paris, before World War II
Paul Reynaud (1878-1966), Paris
by descent to the present owners

La chronique des arts et de la curiosité, no. 12, March 21st, 1903, p. 99 (review of the Zola estate sale)
probably Cécile Sorel, Les belles heures de ma vie, Monaco, 1946, p. 130
Friedrich Matz, "Verschollene Bacchische Sarkophage," Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archölogischen Instituts, vol. 73, 1958, p. 143, fig. 12
Friedrich Matz, Die dionysiche Sarkophage, vol. 4.4, Berlin, 1975, pp. 467 and 469-470, no. 278, pl. 303,1 (drawing by Eichler)
Robert Turcan, Les sarcophages romains à représentations dionysiaques, Paris, 1966, pp. 80, 81, and 543
R.L. Gordon, "A New Mithraic Relief from Rome," Journal of Mithraic Studies, vol. 1, 1976, p. 172 and note 23
Susan MacMillan Arensberg, "Dionysos: A Late Antique Tapestry," Boston Museum Bulletin, vol. 75, 1977, p. 11
Survival of the Gods: Classical Mythology in Medieval Art, exh. cat., Providence, Rhode Island, 1987, p. 40
Erwin Pochmarski, Mitteilungen der Archäologische Gesellschaft Graz, vol. 2, 1988, p. 213, no. 59, pl. 16,2
Andreas Linfert and Gisela Dettloff, Die antiken Skulpturen des Musée municipal von Château-Gontier (Monumenta Artis Romanae, vol. 19) Mainz, 1992, p. 38
Erwin Pochmarski, Dionysische Gruppen: eine typologische Untersuchung zur Geschichte des Stützmotivs(Sonderschriften des Österreichischen Archäologischen Instituts, Bd. 19), Vienna, 1990
Census of Antique Works of Art and Architecture Known in the Renaissance (http://www.census.de), no. 157933

Areas of marble and plaster restorations (some missing) can be singled out using pre-restoration 19th century drawing available online and in printed catalogue, otherwise as shown, surface weathered on raised areas.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

There are only four other known columnar sarcophagi with Dionysiac decoration from metropolitan Roman workshops, each with five arcades resting on spiral columns: see Matz, op. cit., 1975, nos. 276 (Ferentillo), 277 (Berlin), 280 (formerly Rome, now lost), pls. 301-302, and H. Sichtermann, Archäologischer Anzeiger, 1974, p. 317, fig. 13 (fragment).

Until now the present relief was known only through a late 19th century drawing executed when the object was still located at the Villa Taverna in Frascati (see Matz, op. cit., pl. 303,1). Based on the drawing Matz suggested that it could be the same Dionysiac sarcophagus relief which Pirro Ligorio once saw in the entrance to the Church of SS. Cosma e Damiano in Rome between 1553 and 1568 (Codex Neapolitanus XIII B 10, 49: Dessau, Sizungsberichte der königlich preussischen Akademie, vol. XL, 1883, p. 1088f., no. 8). It is unclear how long the relief had been in Frascati by the time Eichler sketched it; most likely it entered the Villa Taverna shortly after Cardinal Scipione Borghese, one of the most famous antiquities collectors of the early Baroque era, acquired the estate in 1614, combined it with his nearby and much grander Villa Mondragone, and had it decorated with its own collection of antique statuary and reliefs (see T.L. Ehrlich, Landscape and Identity in Early Modern Rome: Villa Culture at Frascati in the Borghese Era, Cambridge and New York, 2002, pp. 182-183). In 1754-1756 French architect Pierre-Louis Moreau wrote that he saw several antique reliefs in the vestibule of the Villa Taverna (S. Descat, Le voyage d'Italie de Pierre Moreau, Paris, 2004, p. 70).

In 1894, when visiting Rome with his wife in order to research his forthcoming novel Rome, Émile Zola acquired the present relief together with several other ancient marbles. The sculptures were delivered to him in Paris on January 1895; some of them he displayed at his apartment in Paris, others at his house in Médan. At his 1903 estate sale the Louvre purchased two sarcophagi and an inscribed Roman funerary relief, the latter also from the Villa Taverna (Louvre inv. no. Ma 3493; mentioned in CIL VI 9574, published in V. Kockel, Porträtreliefs stadtrömischer Grabbauten, 1993, p. 139, H3, figs. 48c and 50a-d).

The present panel have inspired a short passage in Zola's Roman novel :

"Contre la muraille de droite, entre deux énormes lauriers, il y avait un sarcophage du deuxième siècle, des faunes violentant des femmes, toute une effrénée bacchanale, une de ces scènes d'amour vorace, que la Rome de la décadence mettait sur les tombeaux" (Rome, Paris, 1896, p. 44).

According to the owner's family oral tradition the present relief once belonged to the flamboyant French actress Cécile Sorel, who had it built against her bathtub in the elaborate bathroom of her hotel particulier in Paris. Sorel's own description of her sarcophagus, however, differs enough from the present relief to prevent positive identification: "The bathroom resembled a temple, with its four columns, its tile floor, and the three steps that led to a Graeco-roman sarcophagus lined with gold mosaic and in which I used to bathe. In the center of the relief was the pure veiled figure of the woman for whom the tomb had been carved. How supremely graceful and decent stood the departed, at whose feet ended a whole saraband of bacchants and fauns dancing the glory of life intoxicated by desire" (Sorel, op. cit., p. 130).

Paul Reynaud, who owned the present panel for several decades, was Président du Conseil (or Prime Minister) of the Third Republic between March and June 1940. After France's defeat he refused to endorse Pétain's armistice with Germany and was jailed for the duration of the war. See Paul Reynaud, Mémoires, vol. 2: Envers et contre tous, 7 mars 1936-16 juin 1940, Paris, 1960.