Antinous went from country boy to the firm favourite of the Emperor Hadrian (AD 11738) to cult figure in just a few years and, since his death in AD 130 (he drowned in the River Nile), he has been commemorated in busts and statues and on coins and medals. Now, he is celebrated at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford.
Born in the Roman province of Bithynia (in modern-day Turkey), Antinous was part of the travelling imperial court on tours in the Greek East. He held no official position, but the tragedy of his untimely death and the emperor’s grief reverberated across the Roman Empire.
Hadrian founded a city in Middle Egypt in his memory and named it Antinopolis, and authorised a portrait bust from a master court sculptor, an image that has been widely reproduced. Over 30 cities in the Greek East minted coins representing Antinous in a range of heroic and divine forms, and cults, venerating the youth as a hero and a god, sprang up in many other cities across the Roman Empire.
‘This is a remarkable set of honours for a person who held no public position whatsoever, neither in his city or in the empire,’ the exhibition’s curator, Bert Smith, Lincoln Professor of Classical Archaeology at Oxford, tells me. ‘The veneration of Antinous is represented today by more than 85 surviving marble statues and busts, for the most part produced in a remarkably short time, between AD 130 and 138.’
One of the most important surviving portraits of Antinous – an inscribed marble bust dated AD 130–38, discovered in Syria in 1879, was recently restored by the Ashmolean’s conservators and now forms the exquisite centrepiece of this small exhibition.
This story is from the November/December 2018 Volume 29 Number 6 edition of Minerva.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the November/December 2018 Volume 29 Number 6 edition of Minerva.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
ROMAN DISCOVERIES AT ANCIENT AUGUSTODUNUM
More than 230 graves have been uncovered at a necropolis in the French city of Autun, revealing a diverse mix in burial practices over a period of nearly 200 years, as well as luxury grave goods from the 3rd and 4th centuries AD that highlight the wealth of some of its ancient inhabitants.
SHAPING THE WORLD: SCULPTURE FROM PREHISTORY TO NOW
The sculptor Antony Gormley and the art historian and critic Martin Gayford have been talking about sculpture with each other for 20 years.
Amelia Edwards (1831-1892)
“I am essentially a worker, and a hard worker, and this I have been since my early girlhood.”
THE GREAT BEYOND
The ancient Greeks thought much about the dead – how their remains should be disposed of, how their spirits might be summoned, how malignant they could be if unavenged. Classicist David Stuttard brings us face to face with the Greek dead.
INTO THE VALLEY OF THE QUEENS
The Great Royal Wife of Ramesses II, Nefertari, was buried in one of the most spectacular tombs of Egypt’s Valley of the Queens. Well-educated and well-travelled, Nefertari played a crucial part in the political life of the pharaoh, and her importance was reflected through her magnificently decorated tomb. Lucia Marchini speaks to Jennifer Casler Price to find out more.
DEIR EL-BAHRI, 1894
Tensions were already high among the archaeologists, surveyors, and artists of the Archaeological Survey of Egypt in 1891 when an eventful dispute arose on Christmas Eve.
PUSHING BOUNDARIES
When the Etruscans expanded to the south and the vast plains of Campania, they found a land of cultural connections and confrontations, as luxurious grave goods found across the region reveal. An exhibition at the National Archaeological Museum in Naples sheds light on these ancient Italians at the frontier. Paolo Giulierini, director of the museum, is our guide.
CUZCO 'CENTRE AND HEAD OF ALL THE LAND'
Cuzco was the heart of the vast Inca empire, but all changed in the 16th century when the capital was conquered by Spanish invaders. Michael J Schreffler investigates the Inca city, and how it went from the centre of one empire to the periphery of another.
A STUDY IN PURPLE
A tiny speck of purple paint from the 2nd century AD may yield clues to how ancient artists created the extraordinary portrait panels that accompanied mummified bodies into the afterlife.
Rome In The 8th Century: A History In Art
John Osborne CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS, £75 HARDBACK - ISBN 978-1108834582
