The Sperlonga sculptures are a large and elaborate ensemble of ancient sculptures discovered in 1957 in the grounds of the former villa of the Emperor Tiberius at Sperlonga, on the coast between Rome and Naples, Italy. As reconstructed, the sculptures were arranged in groups around the interior of a large natural grotto facing the sea used by Tiberius for dining; many scholars believe he had the sculptures installed. The groups portray incidents from the story of the Homeric hero Odysseus in an evocative, Hellenistic style, "a loud, full-blown baroque",Smith, 110 but are generally thought to date to the early Imperial period.
As Tacitus and Suetonius recount,Fully quoted below the grotto collapsed in 26 AD, nearly killing Tiberius, and either then or in a later fall the sculptures were crushed into thousands of fragments, so that the modern reconstructions have many missing elements. A museum was established in 1963 at Sperlonga to display the reconstructed sculptures and other finds from the villa, with cast reconstructions of the large groups,Full name: Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Sperlonga e Villa di Tiberio, Official museum website , the villa's ruins can also be seen. which are described by the classicist Mary Beard as "creative reinventions".Beard, 208 As in the first picture here, many elements can be seen twice, as pieced-together originals, and as reconstructions using plaster casts of original pieces, filled out with educated guesswork.
As usually reconstructed, the sculptures were arranged in four main groups around an artificial circular pool occupying most of the grotto, and connecting to a larger pool outside, one on an island in the centre of the circle. At the rear of the cave and to the right was a group showing the Blinding of Polyphemus the cyclops (one-eyed giant) by Odysseus and his men, dominated by the huge figure of Polyphemus lying drunk. Forward of this, on an island in the middle of the pool, was a group showing Odysseus' ship attacked by the monster Scylla. Two smaller groups placed on the sides of the pool's opening to the main pool outside are usually interpreted as, to the left, a "Pasquino group" of Odysseus carrying the body of Achilles from the battlefield, and to the right, Odysseus about to betray Diomedes after they steal the Trojan cult image of the Palladium from Troy in the course of its siege by the Greeks.Schneider, 92 is one of many of the sources used to illustrate versions of the drawn reconstruction of the ensemble produced by Bernard Andreae.
On a niche in the cliff face above the entrance to the grotto was Ganymede carried up by the Eagle, a disguise of Zeus, apparently from the same period as the Odysseus groups. Some other statues around the grotto appear to belong both to earlier and later periods, and are excluded from the general comments here.Stewart, 79 lists them, but not the two busts now in Copenhagen, for which see Schneider, 94–95; Ridgway 78-79 The sculptures were designed to be seen from a triclinium or dining space with couches, presumably inside at least a tent or a "light pavilion",Blanckenhagen, 100 set on a rectangular island in the fish pond running into the grotto, and presumably also by walking round the grotto itself, and possibly bathing in the pool. They would presumably have been artificially lit, especially at night, as the rear of the grotto would have been rather dim even in daylight. The grotto was also decorated with "artificial stalactites and encrustations" as well as a coloured opus sectile floor, and a "room" left of the Polyphemus group had a number of theatrical masks mounted on the walls, designed to be lit from behind.Ridgway, 87, note 2
The groups The execution of the sculptures varies considerably in quality, and must have required a large team as well as the three masters named in the inscription (see below). But the variation is within as well as between the groups and figures, and scholars accept that the whole ensemble was made as a single project.Stewart, 76 They are marked by an exceptionally extensive use of plain marble struts between sculpted elements, left to strengthen the figures; even the toes of Polyphemus are connected by them. This has been used to argue for off-site production, perhaps in Rhodes, with the struts needed for protection during transport. Many elements are only finished to be viewed from particular angles, with their "back" left roughly worked.Stewart, 88
The initial discovery of the sculptures in 1957 was by civil engineers building the coastal road just above the site, and there was an interval of disturbance to the site before it began to be excavated under proper archaeological direction, which has left the exact original location of some large fragments regrettably imprecise, allowing for prolonged arguments over which pieces belong to which group, and where the groups originally were, which have gradually been resolved as smaller pieces, recorded more professionally, are married up in the continuing process of reconstruction.Prina Ricotti; Herrmann, 275–277. The engineers were not to blame, the archaeological authorities having failed to respond to requests until one of Polyphemus' legs was uncovered. See Weiss, 112–124 for issues she sees as outstanding as at about 2000. In August 1957 Giulio Iacopi, an archaeologist at the Museo Nazionale Romano finally got permission to lead excavations and used the opportunity to further explore.Paul MacKendrick, The Mute Stones Speak: The Story of Archaeology in Italy (W.W. Norton, 1983) p. 217
The four Odysseus groups show the different sides of his complex character, both good and bad: "all in all, the synthesis looks to be literary and Alexandrian, with its exaggeration of the hero's chameleon-like personality and its emphasis, over and above what is in Homer, upon the two extremes of his personality—his courage and his perfidy".Stewart, 82
Pasquino group "Pasquino group" is the name given to a sculptural group in Hellenistic style depicting a warrior supporting the dead body of a comrade, from the fragmentary but well known sculpture nicknamed the Pasquino still erected on a street in Rome. Though it shows some differences to other versions, the Sperlonga group are sufficiently close to be regarded as adaptations of the same original if, as most assume, Sperlonga is not the prime version of the composition, though it is the earliest to survive.Ridgway, 81; Carey, 44 note 1 on the other versions; Blanckenhagen, 102
Usually, as with the Pasquino, the subject is taken to be Menelaus supporting the body of Patroclus, which has been suggested as the subject here, but most scholars agree it is here intended to show Odysseus carrying the body of the dead Achilles off the battlefield outside Troy (or possibly Ajax doing the carrying).Following Andreae, with Hampe and Herrmann unconvinced, Herrmann, 276. See also Blanckenhagen, 102; Weiss, 117–124 identifies the pair as Aeneas and Lausus. This is an unusual subject, not in Homer, but one that is mentioned by Ovid (Metamorposes, 13, 282 ff) and fits the rest of the programme.Blanckenhagen, 102 Here Odysseus is shown at his most conventionally virtuous, demonstrating pietas. The four legs, two trailing on the ground, and the head of the living warrior are the main elements reconstructed so far.
Palladium group
This group also shows an unusual subject. It is mostly thought to represent the moment when, escaping after stealing the Palladium image which protected Troy, Odysseus tries to kill his comrade Diomedes in order to take all the credit himself. Diomedes senses Odysseus' drawn sword behind him, and stalls the attempt. This episode, also not in Homer, shows Odysseus at his least creditable, exhibiting dolus.Stewart, 78 In Metamorphoses 13, 337ff Odysseus boasts of his capture of the Palladium, just as some lines earlier he claims the credit for rescuing the body of Achilles. The episode took place at night, and may be imagined as dimly lit to heighten the effect.
The identification remains somewhat speculative, with the key reassembled piece being the top half of a roughly half-size figure of a helmeted Athena clutched by a roughly life-size hand. With this are associated a headless life-size figure who is not the owner of the clutching hand, and one or more heads. Odysseus may be the figure, with the head and clutching hand belonging to Diomedes.supported by Blanckenhagen, 102; Image is third illustration here Some believe that the head and side of the torso of Odysseus in a Phrygian cap with his nose missing (illustrated) belongs here rather than with the Polyphemus group, as it is placed in the group reconstruction.Such as Hampe, but in his review Herrmann discounts this – Herrmann, 275; as shown here, on Arachne The style of the face of the Palladium figure has been said to represent "a late stage in the transformation of Ionian Hellenistic fleshiness into Julio-Claudian classicism" with archaizing elements found in other Julio-Claudian sculpture.Fullerton, 62
Polyphemus group
As recounted by Homer, the cyclops Polyphemus, who has trapped Odysseus and his crew in his cave home with a huge stone and begun to eat them, has been made drunk and fallen asleep. Odysseus cannot kill him as he would not be able to move the stone, so he heats the tip of a stake of olive wood in the cave in the fire and with that blinds the giant's only eye. The next day he and his men escape by clinging underneath Polyphemus' sheep as he lets them out to graze, feeling only their backs. The moment shown is when the heated stake is being raised into position, and at right one of the companions carrying the wine-skin creeps away trying not to wake the giant; this is perhaps the most complete of the original figures.Boardman, 199–201
This was a more frequent subject in art, and with the Ganymede group is the only part of the whole for which no alternative subject has been suggested. It shows the famous and admired ruthless calliditas or cunning of Odysseus, together with his bravery. Of the three men wielding the shaft, in the cast reconstruction in the museum he is nearest the giant's eye, although this figure is placed by some scholars in the Palladium group instead. The placing of the wineskin-bearer, and whether he was an addition to the putative bronze model for the ensemble, have been much discussed.Blanckenhagen, 100–101 A 3rd century sarcophagus relief at Catania (illustrated below, including wineskin-bearer), is regarded as a simplified version of the Sperlonga Polyphemus group or its model, and was important as a basis for the reconstruction at Sperlonga.Weiss, 112–113
The wineskin-bearer and the lowest companion on the shaft are two of the most complete figures to survive, while of Polyphemus only his head, one huge leg and one foot, one arm and the other hand have so far been pieced together; his reconstructed torso is largely guesswork. This group was the furthest away, at some 40 metres, from the triclinium, at the rear of the grotto to the right, but the visitor could pass in front of it and also mount some steps to the right to obtain much closer views.
Scylla group