Head of Apollo
This head, which has been reworked and is corroded by exposure to the elements, has an oval face and an open mouth with thin lips. The figure’s dreamy expression is emphasised by the incised irises and shield-shaped pupils, reworked in the modern period. The eyes are framed by broad eyebrows. The hair is arranged in a voluminous crown of wavy locks, parted in the middle. In the back, the hair adheres closely to the skull. Some scholars see the sculpture as a simplified version of the Kassel Apollo type, which takes its name for the best copy of the type, preserved in the museum in Kassel. Twenty-six examples of the type are known, some of which are torsos, others heads. The model is believed to have been a renowned proto-Classical original, possibly the Apollo Parnópios (‘locust killer’) sculpted by Phidias in 460–450 BCE. Technical and stylistic analysis of the Borghese sculpture suggests a date in the second century CE.
Object details
Inventory
Location
Date
Classification
Medium
Dimensions
height of the ancient part 30 cm
Provenance
Borghese Collection, cited for the first time in the Inventario Fidecommissario Borghese, 1833, C, p. 41, no. 9. Purchased by the Italian State, 1902.
Commentary
This bust, of unknown provenance, was mentioned for the first time in the Inventario Fidecommissario Borghese, which lists it in the vestibule in 1833. At the end of the nineteenth century, Venturi wrote that it was displayed in Room I, describing it as a portrait of a man.
The head, which has been reworked and is corroded by exposure to the elements, has an oval face and an open mouth with thin lips. The figure’s dreamy expression is emphasised by the incised irises and shield-shaped pupils, reworked in the modern period. The eyes are framed by broad eyebrows. The forehead is slightly rounded. The hair is arranged in a voluminous crown of wavy locks, parted in the middle. In the back, the hair adheres closely to the skull.
According to Lippold, the Borghese head is a simplified version of the Kassel Apollo type, which takes its name from the best copy of the type, preserved in the museum of Kassel. Presumably discovered in 1721 at the Villa of Domitian in Sabaudia, that sculpture was initially in the Conti Collection in Rome (see Schmidt 1966, p. 10; now, Gercke, Zimmermann-Elseify 2007, p. 48, no. 44).
For the Borghese copy, the Roman sculptor merged the original wavy locks into a braid and replaced the braids on the back of the head with a short haircut. Mustilli excluded this variant from his list of copies and derivations (1933, p. 90 note 3), while Schmidt included it among the variants from the second century CE (1966, p. 36, no. 5). It has, however, been left off the updated list of replicas (Davison, Lundgreen & Waywell 2009). As observed by Moreno, the hair of the Borghese head is similar to that of a work previously in the Ludovisi Collection, then in that of W. Clemen in Endorf, which is dated between 160 and 180 CE (Davison, Lundgreen & Waywell 2009, p. 424, no. 9). The present sculpture can be dated to the same period.
Twenty-six examples of the Kassel Apollo type, in bronze and marble, are known, some of which are torsos, others heads (for an updated list of the replicas, see Davison, Lundgreen & Waywell 2009). Scholars agree that it is a copy of a famous proto-Classical original, leading to a search among the work of the greatest artists of the time, such as Calamis, who sculpted the Apollo Alexikakos (‘averter of evil’) displayed in front of the temple of Apollo Patroos in the Athenian agora (Pausanias 1.3.4) in connection with the plague of 430 BCE, or, more plausibly, Phidias, who sculpted the Apollo Parnopios (‘killer of locusts’) described by Pausanias (1.24.8), a votive offering displayed in front of the Parthenon in thanks for saving the city from a locust invasion. According to Strocka’s recent analysis of Phidias’s work, the Apollo Parnopios dates to the mature phase of his activity, about 460–450 BCE (Strocka 2004, pp. 212; 217, no. 5).
The reconstruction and identification of the iconography of the archetype is aided by important numismatic evidence from Athenian mints during the Hellenistic and Imperial periods (Gercke, Zimmermann, Elseify 2007, p. 49, figs 4.10–11), as well as a gem formerly in Berlin (Schmidt 1966, p. 430, no. 27, figs 13, 3), which portrays the god with a bow in his lowered right hand and a laurel branch in his left.
Jessica Clementi
Bibliography
- A. Venturi, Il Museo e la Galleria Borghese, Roma 1893, p. 20.
- G. Giusti, La Galerie Borghèse et la Ville Humbert Premier à Rome, Roma 1904, p. 20.
- W. Amelung, P. Arndt, G. Lippold, Photographische Einzelaufnahmen antiker Skulpturen, X, 1, München 1925, nn. 2720-2721.
- G. Lippold, Griechische Plastik, in “Handbuch der Archäologie“, III, 1, München 1950, p. 142, nota 4.
- D. Mustilli, Di alcune sculture trovate tra il Foro della Pace e l'Anfiteteatro, in “Bullettino della Commissione Archeologica Comunale di Roma”, 61, 1933, pp. 89-109, in part. 90 nota 3.
- E. E. Schmidt, Der Kasseler Apollon und seine Repliken (Antike Plastik, Lieferung V), Berlin 1966, p. 36, n. 5.
- P. Moreno, S. Staccioli, Le collezioni della Galleria Borghese, Milano 1981, p. 101.
- P. Moreno, A. Viacava, I marmi antichi della Galleria Borghese. La collezione archeologica di Camillo e Francesco Borghese, Roma 2003, p. 181, n. 159.
- V. M. Strocka, s.v. Pheidias, in Künstlerlexikon der Antike, 2, a cura di R. Vollkommer, München-Leipzig 2004, pp. 210-36.
- P. Gerke, N. Zimmermann-Elseify, Antikensammlung Museums-Landschaft Hessen Kassel. Antike Skulpturen, Main am Rhein 2007.
- C. Cullen Davison, B. Lundgreen, G. B. Waywell, Pheidias, The Sculptures & Ancient Sources, 1, in “Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies. Supplement”, 2009, pp. 417-432, n. 13.
- Scheda di catalogo 12/01008379, P. Moreno 1975; aggiornamento G. Ciccarello 2021.
