Welcome

Welcome
John William Tuohy lives in Washington DC

Bust of a Youth (“The Beneventum Head”)




Herculaneum, Italy
50 BCE
33 cm  in height
Bronze
Copper inlays for the lips
The sculpture portrays the face of a young man barely out of adolescence. His lips were embellished with red copper and it originally had inlaid eyes. The wreath of wild olive suggests that this figure is a victorious athlete, and the form of the bust indicates that it was set atop the pillar of a herm. The precise arrangement and striations of the hair are reminiscent of works by the fifth-century B.C. sculptor Polykleitos, but the melancholy expression and the delicate appearance of the face are characteristic of first-century B.C. Roman creations made in Classical Greek style.
e work is generally known as the “Benevento Head,” although this name is based on a misunderstanding that has long since been cleared up: the bronze was found not at Benevento but during archaeological excavations carried out at Herculaneum, also in the Campania region of southern Italy. Presented to the lord of Benevento by Ferdinand II, king of the Two Sicilies, the head was later mistakenly thought to have been discovered at Benevento.
(via didoofcarthage)