Extra Content

Discussion

Portrait statue of Flavius Palmatus wearing toga. Aphrodisias (Caria). Late fifth to sixth century.

DESCRIPTION (Object)
Life-size statue with separately worked head. H: 201.5 , W: 69, D: 29 cm. Head H: 30.5 cm. Plinth: 11 cm. Fine-grained (head) and large-grained (body) white marble

The head is separately worked and inserted. The base of the neck has a crack and is not entirely preserved. The tip of the nose is missing.

The inner eyes (pupils and irises) are rendered as a disc which is almost circular. The hair around the face is deeply drilled. The drilling is abandoned behind the ears. The top of the head is flat. A stubble beard and moustache is rendered with taps of a chisel.

PROVENANCE
Excavated at the west colonnade of the Tetrastoon to the east of the Theatre, fallen in front of its in situ base.

DESCRIPTION (Subject)
The statue represents a typical late togatus, holding a mappa and a sceptre. The costume consists of sleeved tunic, the colobium, toga, and the cross-strapped boot-like shoe. He stands on tall plinth and is supported by a set of scrolls. The head wears the Constantinopolitan ‘mop’ hairstyle and a stubbly growth of facial hair.

HONORAND AND DATE
The subject is identified by its base as Flavius Palmatus, governor (of Caria) and acting vicar (of Asiana). He and his statue are loosely dated to the late fifth or early sixth century (see LSA-199).

The head seems small for the statue and may indicate that the statue (already late fourth or more probably fifth century in date given its form) has been re-used for this monument.

Comparanda
Heads with similar hairstyles include two examples from the east stoa of the South Agora at Aphrodisias (LSA-173 and LSA-177), two from Ephesus (LSA-697 and LSA-707), and another from Laodiceia( LSA-385). The same distinctive eye technique appears on all of those heads except that from Laodiceia. A fragment from Aphrodisias also shows these ‘disc’ eyes LSA-219.

R.R.R. Smith

Main Reference

Smith, R.R.R. 'Late antique portraits in a public context: Honorific statuary at Aphrodisias in Caria, AD 300-600' , Journal of Roman Studies, 89 (1999), 155-89, pls. 3 and 11

Inan, J. & E. Alföldi-Rosenbaum, Römische und frühbyzantinische Porträ̈tplastik aus der Türkei : neue Funde, Mainz 1979, 236-8, no. 208, pls. 264-5 (Erim: end 5th)