The Capitoline Antinous

myminifactory

The Capitoline 'Antinous' is a stunning marble statue of a young nude male discovered at Hadrian's Villa, Tivoli, during excavations led by Conte Giuseppe Fede. The statue was purchased before 1733 by Alessandro Cardinal Albani and became the main attraction of his collection. Pope Clement XII bought it in 1733 and it eventually formed the core of the Capitoline Museums in Rome, where it remains to this day. The restored left leg and arm, featuring an unexpected rhetorical hand gesture, were added by Pietro Bracci. In the 18th century, the statue was considered one of the most beautiful Roman copies of a Greek statue in the world. Its fleshy face and physique, combined with its downturned look, led many to believe it represented Hadrian's lover Antinous. The statue was among the artwork taken to Paris under the Treaty of Tolentino in 1797 and remained there until 1815, when it was returned to Rome following Napoleon's downfall. Its distinctive hair, which deviates from more well-known Antinous types, has led experts to reclassify the statue as a Roman Imperial-era copy of an early 4th century BC Greek statue of Hermes. This change in identification had already begun before 1900, when Augustus Hare noted in his book 'Walks in Rome' that: "[the statue's] identity has only once been seriously questioned; yet it may be considered more than uncertain. The head is almost certainly not [Antinous's]. I am unsure how it came to be placed on a body so closely resembling the Antinous type. A careful comparison of the torso and arms even raises the question whether this magnificent statue might not be a Hermes or a hero from an earlier era [than Antinous]."