Rome's Capitolini Museums has
unveiled an important addition to its collection of classical
antiquities - a unique, nearly life-sized, dark marble statue
found at an Imperial era villa in what was once suburban Rome.
The Vignacce Marsyas was presented at the Capitoline
Museums in the temporary exhibition "Marsyas: Pride Punished",
by city archeology superintendent Claudio Parisi Presicce.
The 149 centimeter-high statue depicts the violent end to a
Greek myth, when the satyr and would-be musician Marsyas is tied
to a tree and flayed after losing a music battle to Apollo.
In the Vignacce Marsyas, the bloodied skin is rendered by
head, arms, torso and legs of a veiny red marble, while hands
and feet would have been white marble.
Unique to other figurative antiquities, the Vignacce
Marsyas is almost entirely intact, missing only one hand and
both feet.
"It is a particularly important discovery", Presicce said.
"By now, we are almost certain that the work is part of a
tradition of a very important and famous bottega of sculptors
whose signatures we know".
Since its discovery, the Marsyas statue has been in the
hands of the City of Rome and conservation consortium Conart for
a 25,000-euros restoration program which included revealing
precious eye details such as inlaid white glass paste, colored
iris and bronze eye-lid rimming as well as identifying the
provenance via its colored marble.
According to Presicce, being able to identify who made the
sculptures was "very rare".
In the case of the Vignacce Marsyas, the marble was
attributed to the work to a group of artisans in Rome in the
beginning of the 2nd century AD.
"It is a group of original sculptors from Aphrodisias in
Asia Minor who, during Hadrianic era, created statues of great
value", Presicce said.
The Capitoline collection has only three other dark colored
marbled statues - a faun and two centaurs all found at Emperor
Hadrian's villa in Tivoli, most likely from the same artisans.
The Vignacce Marsyas was uncovered in 2009 at Villa delle
Vignacce, a four-year excavation conducted by the US non-profit
American Institute for Roman Culture AIRC with international
students.
In years prior, the archaeological team found marble
statuary including a head Aesculapius and head of a small boy.
"The discovery of Marsyas as well as our previous finds
like the Aesculapius head is an indication that this so-called
villa contains far more sculptures," said Darius Arya, AIRC
director and archaeologist.
"It is a truly important site yet to yield all its
secrets".
The Vignacce Marsyas will be on display in the Capitoline
Museums' Palazzo dei Conservatori through February 1, 2015
before moving to its permanent location at the Capitoline's
Centrale Montemartini location.
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