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Details
LOT 0876
Roman Bone Venus Statuette
2ND-3RD CENTURY A.D.
1 5/8 in. (4.9 grams, 40 mm).
Modelled in the round, Venus standing nude with hands raised to dress her hair; dorsal pillar pierced at shoulder height for suspension. [No Reserve]
Provenance
From a collection acquired on the UK art market from various auction houses and collections mostly before 2000.
From an important Cambridgeshire estate; thence by descent.
Literature
Cf. Rolland, H., Bronzes Antiques de Haute Provence, Paris, 1965, item 78, for type; Ogden, J.M., Gold Jewellery in Ptolemaic, Roman and Byzantine Egypt,Durham, 1990, Vol.2, fig.13, for identical statuette in cast bronze.
Footnotes
The iconography of Venus Anadyomene was one of the most commonly used images of the goddess in classical sculpture, and was still popular during the late Roman Empire. The best example of this is the Louvre Venus Anadyomene (Ma 3537) of the 4th century A.D., found in the 19th century at Saint George de la Montagne near Bordeaux, inside a rich aristocratic house and coming from Aphrodisias, an ancient place of statuary production for export.
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