Dying Gaul

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The Dying Gaul, a Roman marble copy of a Hellenistic work of the late third century BCE Capitoline Museums, Rome

The Dying Gaul (in Italian: Galata Morente) is an ancient Roman marble copy of a lost ancient Greek statue, thought to have been executed in bronze, that was commissioned some time between 230 BC and 220 BC by Attalos I of Pergamon to honor his victory over the Galatians. The present base was added after its rediscovery. The identity of the statue's sculptor is unknown but it has been suggested that Epigonus, the court sculptor of the Attalid dynasty of Pergamon, may have been its author.

The statue depicts a dying Celt with remarkable realism, particularly in the face. He is represented as a Gallic warrior with a typically Gallic hairstyle and moustache. The figure is naked save for a neck torc. He is shown fighting against death, refusing to accept his fate. The statue serves both as a reminder of the Celts' defeat, thus demonstrating the might of the people that defeated them, and a memorial to their bravery as worthy adversaries. It also provides evidence to corroborate ancient accounts of the Gallic fighting style; Julius Caesar records in his account of the Gallic War that the Gauls went into battle naked save for their weapons.

Dying gaul, detail showing his torc

The Dying Gaul became one of the most celebrated works to have survived from antiquity and was endlessly copied and engraved by artists and sculptors. It is thought to have been rediscovered in the early 17th century during excavations for the foundations of the Villa Ludovisi and was first recorded in 1623 in the collections of the powerful Ludovisi family of Rome. It shows signs of having been repaired, with the head seemingly having been broken off at the neck, though it is unclear whether the repairs were carried out in Roman times or after the statue's 17th century rediscovery.^[1]

The artistic quality and expressive pathos of the statue aroused great admiration among the educated classes in the 17th and 18th centuries. It was widely copied, with kings, academics and wealthy landowners commissioning their own reproductions of the Dying Gaul. The less well-off could purchase copies of the statue in miniature for use as ornaments and paperweights. The statue was a "must-see" sight on the Grand Tour of Europe undertaken by young men of the day; Byron was one such visitor, commemorating the Dying Gaul in his poem Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (canto 4, stanzas 140-141).

During this period, some misinterpreted the statue's theme as representing a defeated gladiator, leading to the coining of several (entirely erroneous) alternative names for the statue: the 'Dying' or 'Wounded Gladiator', 'Roman Gladiator', and 'Murmillo Dying'. It has also been called the 'Dying Trumpeter'.^[2]

It was requisitioned by Napoleon Bonaparte by terms of the Treaty of Campoformio (1797) during his invasion of Italy and taken in triumph to Paris, where it was put on display. It was returned to Rome in 1815 and is currently on display in the Capitoline Museums.

Copies of the statue can be seen in the Museum of Classical Archaeology at Cambridge University and the Courtauld Gallery in London, as well as in Berlin, Prague and Stockholm. In the United states, copies are at the Washington State Historical Society in Tacoma, Washington and at the Redwood Library, Newport, Rhode Island.

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[edit] References

• A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. James McKillop. Oxford University Press, 1998
• Art in the Hellenistic Age, Pollitt, J. J., 1986
• The Bloomsbury Guide to Art, Ed. Shearer West. Bloomsbury Publishing Ltd, 1996
• Hellenistic Sculpture, Smith, R.R.R. London, 1991
• Taste and the Antique, Haskell, F. and N. Penny. New Haven and London, 1981. Cat. no. 44, pp 224ff.
• The Oxford Companion to Western Art. Ed. Hugh Brigstocke. Oxford University Press, 2001