A Roman Marble Sarcophagus Relief Fragment, circa 180 A.D.

Giulio Monteverde (1837-1917), Rome, prior to 1882

Nils Ebbessøn Astrup (1901-1972), Oslo, acquired in the 1950s/1960s on the advice of Hans Peter L'Orange (1903-1983), founder and director of the Norwegian Institute in Rome

Norwegian private collection, Oslo, by descent from the above

by descent from the above to the present owner

Documented

photograph accessioned in 1970 in the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut Rom: D-DAI-ROM-70.1035: arachne.dainst.org/entity/5547585

("jetzt: Rom, Norweg. Inst.")

Published

Friedrich Matz and Friedrich v. Duhn, Antike Bildwerke in Rom, vol. 3, Leipzig, 1882, p. 18, no. 3497

Kazimierz Bulas, Les illustrations antiques de l’Iliade, Lwow, 1929, p. 99, note 1

Guntram Koch and Hellmut Sichtermann, Römische Sarkophage (Handbuch der Archäologie), Munich, 1982, p. 130f.

Rolf M. Schneider, Bunte Barbaren. Orientalenstatuen aus farbigem Marmor in der römischen Repräsentationskunst, Worms, 1986, p. 18, note 13

Dagmar Grassinger, Die mythologischen Sarkophage. Achill bis Amazonen (Die antiken Sarkophagreliefs, vol. XII.1), Berlin, 1999, p. 208, no. 38, pl. 36,3

Rolf M. Schneider, "Barbar," in Reallexikon für Antike und Christentum. Supplement, vol. 1, Stuttgart, 2001, col. 927

Andreas Grüner, "Gabe und Geschenk in der römischen Staatskunst," in Hilmar Klinkott et al., eds., Geschenke und Steuern, Zölle und Tribute. Antike Abgabenformen in Anspruch und Wirklichkeit, Leiden, 2007, p. 447

The youth could represent either a servant or a subdued barbarian bringing gifts to the imperator. A related servant figure wearing a Phrygian cap and carrying a krater appears on a sarcophagus panel in the Louvre depicting the funeral of Patroclus: F. Baratte and C. Metzger, Musée du Louvre. Catalogue des sarcophages en pierre d'époques romaine et paléochrétienne, 1985, pp. 46-49, no. 14 (https://collections.louvre.fr/en/ark:/53355/cl010277198).

For other marble sculpture from the Nils Astrup Collection sold at Sotheby’s see New York, June 8th, 2011, no. 42 ("Pseudo-Seneca"), June 3rd, 2015, nos. 28 (bearded head of Dionysos) and 50 (a Julio-Claudian portrait bust of a man), and London, July 2nd, 2019, no. 247 (a portrait head of Aristotle).