Offered by Franck Baptiste Paris
Rare head in white Carrara marble representing the emperor "Lucius Septimius Bassianus" better known by the nickname of Carracala. (Lyon Gaul 188 AD - Carrahe Syria 217 AD).
He is represented as a child at the age of ten or twelve with beautiful hair with large locks that fall over his forehead and ears.
His youthful face has a small mouth with tight lips, a strong and wide nose, a clear forehead and a straight look with finely incised pupils, which are surmounted by two just sketched eyebrows.
Very good state of conservation, significant breakage with loss to the right part of the neck, circular hole corresponding to a trace of tenon on the nape of the neck.
Italian work from the end of the 16th century or the very beginning of the 17th century.
Ebony base.
Dimensions:
Head: Height: 32 cm; Width: 20 cm
Ebony base: Height: 18 cm; Width: 15.5 cm; Depth: 15.5 cm
Total height: 51 cm
Similar head:
- Louvre Museum, Paris, Bust of Caracalla as a child, former Scipione Caffarelli-Borghèse collection (1577-1663) purchased from Prince Camille Borghèse by Napoleon in 1807.
Our opinion:
The iconography of the head that we present is designated by art historians under the term "Caracalla of the Arch of the Argentiers"; we can indeed recognize the same features on the portrait of the young emperor represented on this building built in Rome in 204 AD and still in place.
But the first version was probably a bust made for the nomination of the young Lucius to the title of Augustus in 198.
Several antique heads of this model have come down to us, a bust is kept at the NY Carlsberg glyptotek in Copenhagen (Inv No. 731), another bust from the Chiragan villa is kept at the Saint-Raymond museum in Toulouse (Inv No. RA 119), a head from the Markouna excavations in Algeria is kept at the Louvre Museum (Inv No. MA 1173).
But our head is completely similar to the one on the bust in the Louvre Museum (inv. No. MA 431) from the collection of Cardinal Scipione Borghese that was sold by Prince Camille Borghese to Napoleon in 1807.
This sculpture with idealized mannerism, with canons very inspired by the Florentine Renaissance, dates from the end of the 16th century or the very beginning of the 17th century.
Our head shows slightly more wear than the Borghese head that was optimally preserved for two centuries in Rome before two centuries in the Louvre Museum; but it comes from the same workshop, and as the trace of tenon in the neck indicates, it was also mounted on a bust.
At that time, many collectors wanted to own sets of busts of emperors to adorn the great galleries of their palaces and the antique heads were either lacking because of their rarity or they were too damaged to be presented.
The greatest sculptors therefore set about copying the antique models and this since the Renaissance, but a slight Mannerist influence allows us quite easily to recognize this revised and idealized antiquity.
We do not know if Cardinal Borghese commissioned this work directly from a sculptor at the very beginning of the 17th century or if he bought this bust like many other sculptures, which would indicate an older manufacture, perhaps from the end of the 16th century, but what is certain is that our head constitutes a very beautiful example of this Italian production.
