A Roman Marble Amazonomachy Sarcophagus Relief Fragment, Antonine Period, circa 150-170 A.D.

Cardinal Federico Cesi (1500-1565), Palazzo Cesi, Rome

Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi (1595-1632), Pope Gregory XV from 1621 to 1623, Villa Ludovisi, Rome, acquired from the above in 1622

sold by the Ludovisi family in the late 1890s/early 1900s

Didier Aaron, Paris

acquired from the above by the present owner in 1980

Published

Theodor Schreiber, Die antiken Bildwerke der Villa Ludovisi in Rom, Leipzig, 1880, p. 257f., no. 335

Carl Robert, Die antiken Sarkophag-Reliefs, vol. II, Berlin, 1890, p. 104, no. 85, pl. 35

Salomon Reinach, L'album de Pierre Jacques, sculpteur de Reims, dessiné à Rome de 1572 à 1577, Paris, 1902, pl. 4 Christian Hülsen, Römische Antikengärten des XVI. Jahrhunderts, Heidelberg, 1917, p. 30, no. 114

Carl Robert, Die antiken Sarkophag-Reliefs, vol. III,3, Berlin, 1919, p. 553, no. 85, illus.

Jole Bovio, "Le figure angolari dei sarcofagi figurati romani", Bullettino della Commissione Archeologica Comunale di Roma, vol. 52, 1925, p. 162

Roman Redlich, Die Amazonensarkophage des 2. und 3. Jahrhunderts n. Chr., Berlin, 1942, p. 54f.

Beatrice Palma, I marmi Ludovisi. Storia della collezione (Museo Nazionale Romano. Le sculture, vol. I,4), Rome, 1983, p. 11f.

Beatrice Palma et al., I marmi Ludovisi dispersi (Museo Nazionale Romano. Le sculture, vol. I,6), Rome, 1986, p. 289f., no. IX,12

Dagmar Grassinger, Die mythologischen Sarkophage (Die antiken Sarkophagreliefs, vol. XII,1), Berlin, 1999, p. 239, no. 99, fig. 15

Christian Russenberger, Der Tod und die Mädchen. Amazonen auf römischen Sarkophagen, Berlin, 2015, p. 466, no. 6, fig. 155

The present relief fragment is first documented in a drawing by Pierre Jacques from the 1570s, as it was kept in the garden of the (no longer) extant Palazzo Cesi in Rome, near the Basilica of Saint Peter. The Cesi "open-air museum" of antiquities was a major center of attraction for art lovers in general and Dutch artists in particular, such as Marten van Heemskerck, who drew several views of the garden, and Henrick van Cleef III, who painted a detailed panoramic view of the Palazzo and garden. A female draped statue from the Cesi collection, the famous Aphrodite later at Syon House, was sold at Sotheby’s, London, July 9th, 2014, no. 17.

The present fragment was acquired with numerous other sculptures in the early 17th century by Ludovico Ludovisi (Pope Gregory XV, 1621/3), and later transferred to the storerooms of his villa. A statue of a young satyr wearing a mask from the Ludovisi collection was sold at Sotheby’s, New York, December 12th, 2013, no. 43.

For a more complete and closely related scene on an amazonomachy sarcophagus on display in the Cortile del Belvedere in the Vatican since the 16th Century see D. Grassinger, op. cit. p. 240, no. 101, pls. 97-99.

In a recent synthesis on the subject of Amazons on Roman sarcophagi, Russenberger cit. pp. 337ff. linked the present fragment to an equally fragmentary sarcophagus in Ostia and compared the motifs with the battle frieze of the temple of Athena-Nike at Athens.