The bronze ''Seated Hermes'', found at the

Villa of the Papyri The Villa of the Papyri ( it, Villa dei Papiri, also known as ''Villa dei Pisoni'' and in early excavation records as the ''Villa Suburbana'') was an ancient Roman villa in Herculaneum, in what is now Ercolano, southern Italy. It is named afte ...

in Herculaneum in 1758, is at the

National Archaeological Museum of Naples The National Archaeological Museum of Naples ( it, Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, italic=no, sometimes abbreviated to MANN) is an important Italian archaeological museum, particularly for ancient Roman remains. Its collection includes wor ...

. "This statue was probably the most celebrated work of art discovered at Herculaneum and Pompeii in the eighteenth century",

Francis Haskell Francis James Herbert Haskell, (7 April 1928 – 18 January 2000) was an English art historian, whose writings placed emphasis on the social history of art. He wrote one of the first and most influential patronage studies, ''Patrons and Painte ...

and

Nicholas Penny Sir Nicholas Beaver Penny (born 21 December 1949) is a British art historian. From 2008 to 2015 he was director of the National Gallery in London. Early life Penny was educated at Shrewsbury School before he studied English at St Catharine ...

have observed, once four large engravings reproducing it had appeared in '' Le Antichità di Ercolano'', 1771. To protect it from Napoleonic depredations, it was packed into one of the fifty-two cases of antiquities and works of art that accompanied the Bourbon flight to Palermo in 1798. It was once again in the royal villa at

Portici Portici (; ) is a town and ''comune'' of the Metropolitan City of Naples in Italy. It is the site of the Portici Royal Palace. Geography Portici lies at the foot of Mount Vesuvius on the Bay of Naples, about southeast of Naples itself. There i ...

in 1816 (Haskell and Penny 1981:269).

Martin Robertson Charles Martin Robertson (11 September 1911 – 26 December 2004) was a British classical scholar and poet. He specialised in the art and archaeology of Ancient Greece. Early life He was the elder son of Donald Struan Robertson and Petica Cour ...

(1975, vol I:474) classifies it as a Roman copy, made before AD 79, of a Greek bronze original of the late fourth or early third century BC, in the tradition of Lysippos, whose name has been invoked in connection with the sculpture since its first reappearance. Margarete Bieber classifies it as "school of Lysippos" and dates it ''ca'' 100 BC. Many bronze statues posed on actual rocks must have been set up in late Hellenistic and Roman gardens, where, Brunilde Sismondo Ridgway suggests, Ridgway, "The Setting of Greek Sculpture" ''Hesperia'' 40.3 (July - September 1971:336-356) pp 346f. natural boulders "increased the idyllic aspect of the composition." The ''Hermes'' rests his hand casually on the (restored) rock, integrating the composition.

Notes

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References

*Haskell, Francis, and Nicholas Penny, 1981. ''Taste and the Antique: the Lure of Classical Sculpture 1500-1900'' (Yale University Press), cat. no. 62, pp 267–269. *Mattusch, Carol C. 2005. ''The Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum. Life and Afterlife of a Sculpture Collection.'' (Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum), esp. chapter 5 and pp. 88–89, 216–222, and fig. 2.43. *Robertson, Martin, 1975. ''A History of Greek Art'' (Cambridge University Press) Hellenistic and Roman bronzes Collections of the National Archaeological Museum, Naples Archaeological discoveries in Italy Ancient Greek metalwork Nude sculptures