Torso of a Resting Satyr
Culture: Roman
Date: 1st-2nd century A.D.
Medium: Marble
Dimensions:
height: 33 1/4 in. (84.5 cm)
width: 20 7/8 in. (53 cm)
depth: 14 5/16 in. (36.4 cm)
Credit Line: Gift of Gilbert M. Denman, Jr.
Object number: 86.134.147
Provenance: with Rocchi (probably Giulio Simotti Rocchi), Rome, by 1929; sold by Jean-Luc Chalmin, Neuilly, and Christian Boursaud, Geneva, to Gilbert M. Denman, Jr. (1921-2004), San Antonio, 1980; Gilbert M. Denman, Jr., by gift to San Antonio Museum of Art, 1986
Published References
Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Rome, photo archive, neg. 1929.316.
P. Gercke, Satyrn des Praxiteles (Hamburg, 1968), 33, no. T9.
C. Picón, "Ancient Art from the Denman Collection," SAMA Quarterly (Winter 1987) 15, 19.
J. Daehner, "Grenzen der Nacktheit: Studien zum nackten männlichen Körper in der griechischen Plastik des 5. und 4. Jahrhunderts v. Chr.," Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts 120 (2005) 267 n. 425.
J.-L. Martinez, "Les Satyres de Praxitèle," in A. Pasquier and J.-L. Martinez, Praxitèle (Paris, 2007), 258 no. 54.
Label Text
In Greek and Roman mythology, satyrs were part human, part-animal followers of Dionysus (the Roman Bacchus), the god of wine. This torso belonged to a larger statue of a satyr who, perhaps tired from his revels, rests against a tree. He wears a panther skin. Statues of a resting satyr like this one were very popular in the Roman world: more than one hundred replicas of this composition survive. The composition may have been adapted from a statue carved by the famous Greek sculptor Praxiteles in the middle of the 4th century B.C. (Jessica Powers, 2008)
On view
In Collection(s)
The San Antonio Museum of Art is in the process of digitizing its permanent collection. This electronic record was created from historic documentation that does not necessarily reflect SAMA's complete or current knowledge about the object. Review and updating of such records is ongoing.
This resource has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor.
