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Friday, January 7, 2022

Duo


I think these are two disparate characters who just happened 
to be next to each other in a museum.  Anybody know for sure?

 

5 comments:

  1. I should know the male with the snake...I saw these statues somewhere...the Uffizi, maybe? The memory is the second thing to go.

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  2. Two statues of Antinous (the Omphalos Apollo) from the Altes Museum in Berlin. Roman but possibly copies of Greek bronzes?

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  3. Antinous was the lover of Publius Aelius Hadrianus, who reigned as the Emperor Hadrian (117–138). Hadrian conducted the successful Second Roman–Jewish War (132–136) against Simon bar Kokhba. Upon victory, he sowed the soil of Judaea with salt, and banned Jews from Jerusalem, which he renamed Aelia Capitolina. It is not known where or when he met Antinous. He had a notoriously bad relationship with his wife, Vibia Sabina, and fell intensely in love with Antinous, who became the imperial favourite. Antinous drowned in the Nile during an imperial visit to Egypt. Suicide, murder and religious sacrifice have all been mooted but the exact circumstances are lost to history. Hadrian wept "like a woman" according to the Historia Augusta upon learning of his lover's death.

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    1. I have been a fan of Hadrian for many years, having visited his villa, his tomb, the Pantheon which he rebuilt, and numerous museums containing statues/busts of him. I think I even featured some of the latter on my old tumblr blog.

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