Details

LOT 0918

Roman Bronze Grotesque Figure with Paenula

2ND CENTURY A.D.

3 1/2 in. (110 grams total, 90 mm including stand).

Hollow-formed with short hair and a beret, wearing a paenula military cloak extending to the hips; mounted on a custom-made display stand. [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

See Reinach, S., Répertoire de la statuaire Grecque et Romaine, Paris, 1897, pp.469-470.

Footnotes

Telesphorus, dressed in the Gallo-Roman manner with the long hooded military cloak (folded on his back), was the subject of many votive statuettes in Roman Gaul. Son of Aesculapius, god of medicine, he certainly had a connection with the world of healing and medical care, and was associated with his sister Hygeia. He belonged to the Celtic pantheon and was spread to the East by the Galatians of Asia Minor. His cult then spread to the West, particularly in the Hadrianic period, as attested by his images found on the Wall at Birdoswald.