Battle sarcophagi of the 2nd and 3rd century

Discussion of a Roman sarcophagus with battle scene, Antonine Period, 2nd century CE marble at the Dallas Museum of Art: 

The complex composition of this battle scene—with warriors, horses, captives, and trophies of armor intertwined to suggest the violence and bloodshed of war—is typical of Roman relief carvings during the Antonine period (138–192 CE). The sarcophagus was probably made to celebrate the victories of a Roman general in the series of wars that Rome fought with Germanic tribesmen along the Danube frontier, in what are now Hungary and Romania; however, the prototype for the scene might have been a monument created by the Greek King Attalos I of Pergamon in Asia Minor during the 3rd century BCE, which was erected to signify the Greek defeat of the barbarian Celtic invaders. The nude warriors with torques around their necks follow descriptions of Celtic warriors by classical authors. The powerfully modeled and lively Pergamene art style was much admired during the Roman Empire. Here it seems to have been adapted to a Roman taste for historical realism. The man buried in such a battle sarcophagus, several examples of which have survived, probably wished to identify his life and career with well-known Greek scenes of military triumph. - Excerpt from Anne Bromberg, Label copy (1999.107), 2001.

I actually photographed this sarcophagus at the Dallas Museum of Art in Dallas, Texas three years before I visited the Palazzo Altemps in Rome and photographed the famous 3rd century CE Ludovisi Battle sarcophagus dating to 250-260 CE.  Its barbaric figures have been generally identified as Goths and the Romans wear mail shirts of a longer length characteristic of the later period.  However, the Ludovisi sarcophagus is considered an outlier of the trend for deceased commanders to commission such burial artwork.  Of the 25 such sarcophagi that have been found, 24, like the Dallas example, were sculpted during the Antonine Period. 

The scenes depicted were intended to represent Roman values of heroic struggle and glorification of the hero, as well as themes of good over evil and civilized men over barbarians with Romans viewing themselves as preservers of civilization.  Stylistically, the scenes were modelled after the representations seen on the column of Marcus Aurelius. 

The art historian Donald Strong points to a subtle difference in theme between the Antonine sarcophagi and the Ludovisi symbolism however. From the time of the reign of the Antonine emperors, Roman art increasingly depicted battles as chaotic, packed, single-plane scenes presenting dehumanized barbarians mercilessly subjugated by Roman military might, ironically, at a time when in fact the Roman Empire was gradually being overwhelmed by constant invasions that would ultimately lead to the fall of the empire in the West.  After this period there was a transition from mythological battle scenes to historical battles where the deceased person in the sarcophagus was specifically commemorated in the relief and his conquest of death inferred.  

"The barbarians (of the Ludovisi sarcophagus) all seem frozen in the moment before disaster and death overwhelm them. Their attitudes are highly theatrical but none the less immensely expressive... The main theme is no longer the glorification of military prowess but that of transcending the struggle, presumably conveying the notion of triumph over death ... The ugliness of pain and suffering is stressed by the dishevelled hair, the tormented eyes, the twisted mouth." - Donald Strong, Art historian

Differences in scale between the figures, though present, became far less marked than in earlier Antonine sarcophagi, too, such that the general is only slightly larger than his troops or enemies.  Nor is the general seen wearing a helmet or in the act of combat, as in the earlier sarcophagi.

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Roman Sarcophagus with Battle Scene Antonine Period  2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

Grand Ludovisi battle sarcophagus 250-260 CE photographed at the Palazzo Altemps in Rome, Italy

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Antonine Female Portraiture

 This nobly restrained composite statue depicts a virtuous Roman matron of a distinguished family. She is commemorated as both a chaste wife and mother of children, and her portrait celebrates marriage as an enduring value and symbol of Roman life. This figure provides a notable contrast with the DMA's luxuriant Roman portrait head of a youth (1984.163) in both style and character. Whereas the boy exudes exuberant youth with his active gaze and foppish curls, the Roman matron embodies the discreetly refined dignity of an aristocratic lady.  She holds her mantle like a veil over her shoulder and stands in modest dignity, as though she were a priestess of the home.

Often found in imperial female portrait statues, the body type is based on Greek draped figures from the 4th century BCE. Associated with the work of Late Classical sculptors such as Praxiteles or Lysippus, figures like this of the so-called Small Herculaneum type were frequently adapted in Roman art. Here the heavily draped figure, suggesting the virtuous character of the woman, was either a commemorative funerary portrait or a civic/religious dedication. The portrait head used with this standard body type is graceful and pensive. The complete figure radiates a gentle nobility that embodies the best traditions of Roman family life and the high value accorded to distinguished Roman women. In appearance, the lady recalls imperial Antonine women such as the younger Faustina, wife of Marcus Aurelius, though the figure is not sufficiently close to either her or her daughter, Lucilla, to be an actual royal portrait.  - Dallas Museum of Art

 Figure of a woman Roman 2nd century CE photographed at the Dallas Museum of Art in Dallas, Texas.

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The Metamorphosis of Polyphemus

The Cyclops Polyphemus from the Antonine period 2nd - 3rd century CE photographed at the Capitoline Museum in Rome, Italy.

Depictions of the Cyclops Polyphemus have differed radically, depending on the literary genres in which he has appeared, and have given him an individual existence independent of the Homeric herdsman encountered by Odysseus. In the epic he was a man-eating monster dwelling in an unspecified land.

Some centuries later, a dithyramb by Philoxenus of Cythera, followed by several episodes by the Greek pastoral poets, created of him a comedic and generally unsuccessful lover of the water nymph Galatea. In the course of these he woos his love to the accompaniment of either a cithara or the pan-pipes. Such episodes take place on the island of Sicily, and it was here that the Latin poet Ovid also set the tragic love story of Polyphemus and Galatea recounted in the Metamorphoses.

Still later tradition made him the eventually successful husband of Galatea. According to some accounts, the Celts (Galati in Latin) were descended from their son Galatos, while Appian credited them with three children, Celtus, Illyrius and Galas, from whom descended the Celts, the Illyrians and the Gauls.  That their conjunction was fruitful is also implied in a later Greek epic from the turn of the 5th century CE. In the course of his Dionysiaca, Nonnus gives an account of the wedding of Poseidon and Beroe, at which the Nereid "Galatea twangled a marriage dance and restlessly twirled in capering step, and she sang the marriage verses, for she had learnt well how to sing, being taught by Polyphemos with a shepherd’s syrinx."

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