FUNERARY STELE, 500-490 BCE. CAPITOLINE MUSEUMS This beautiful Greek relief in Thasian marble shows a young woman in full profile facing right, holding a dove in her hand. It is a funerary stele, probably from Athens, and is of the same Ionian school of sculpture as the Ludovisi Throne, though not from the same place. This is archaic Greek sculpture just before it bursts into full classical bloom: the young woman's face is somewhat hieratic, with an eye as seen from the front, not the side, but the folds of her chiton are drawn with exquisite delicacy. A number of original Greek works were found in the same area, suggesting the original collector had a particular interest in this type of art. This comes from the Horti Lamiani in the area of today's piazza Vittorio. They were the creation of the consul L. Aelius Lamia, a friend of Tiberius, and Lamia left the gardens to him. They were richly redeveloped by the emperor Caligula, who used the Horti as his main residence.

For #ReliefWednesday we're admiring a delicate #relief from #Athens, bought in antiquity by a consular collector and used to decorate his gardens, the #HortiLamiani in #Rome. Once covered in bright #polychromy, when this was discovered in the 1880s it had lost all its colour. #ClassicsBluesky 🏺