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Archaeology news on Ancient Rome and the Roman Empire
Rare Statue of Roman Emperor Found
Italian police have recovered a rare statue of a Roman emperor who co-ruled alongside Marcus Aurelius and was known for his reluctance to sit for portraits. Police said Friday that the marble head of Lucius Verus was the most spectacular find among more than a dozen looted ancient artifacts hidden in a boat garage near Rome. The bearded visage of Lucius Verus is believed to have been secretly unearthed at a site in the Naples area and was probably destined for the international market, said Capt. Massimo Rossi of a special police unit that hunts down archaeological thieves. |
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SPQR - News |
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Rare Statue of Roman Emperor Found
By ARIEL DAVID
ROME (AP) — Italian police have recovered a rare statue of a Roman emperor who co-ruled alongside Marcus Aurelius and was known for his reluctance to sit for portraits.
Police said Friday that the marble head of Lucius Verus was the most spectacular find among more than a dozen looted ancient artifacts hidden in a boat garage near Rome.
The bearded visage of Lucius Verus is believed to have been secretly unearthed at a site in the Naples area and was probably destined for the international market, said Capt. Massimo Rossi of a special police unit that hunts down archaeological thieves.
Experts consider Lucius Verus' head a find of great scholarly value. Because of his desire to stay out of the limelight, there are only four other known portraits of him, Rossi said.
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Lucius Verus co-ruled Rome from 161 until his death in 169 alongside the more powerful Marcus Aurelius, his adoptive brother. Ceramic vases stolen from an Etruscan tomb in central Italy were also among the stash recovered last month in the port town of Fiumicino, near Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport. Police said they were traced to an antiquities dealer in the Italian capital. No arrests have been made, but 13 people were being investigated for antiquities trafficking, Rossi said.
In a separate operation, Italy recovered a marble head depicting Faustina, the wife of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, the predecessor and adoptive father of Lucius Verus and Marcus Aurelius. Faustina's portrait had been stolen in 1961 from an ancient theater in Minturno, south of Rome, and made its way to an American collector. The statue was returned by the collector through U.S. authorities after he realized it had been looted, Rossi said. The two statues will be among items displayed April 24-June 19 in the Castel Sant-Angelo, Rome's ancient papal fortress.
New findings around the Colosseum
The work to repave the area around the base of the Colosseum on its western side has brought to light new archaeological findings. At the beginning of April a marble piece measuring a metre and a half of an equestrian statue was found and then two days later the head of a male statue was discovered, both of which had been only 50cm below the surface. According to archaeologists the piece of the equestrian statue suggests one of an emperor due to its size and most likely adorned the arch over the imperial entrance. The head is too small to be that of the rider of the horse in the equestrian statue.
The goal of the repaving of the area around the Colosseum is to bring it back to its original height by lowering the cobblestones by 80cm. Soon work will also begin on redoing the ramp that leads from Via Capo Africa to the amphitheatre, while work has already begun for the metro line C on the side of the Fori Imperiali. The digging that these projects require is expected to uncover further archaeological findings.
The Colosseum, originally known as the Flavian Amphitheatre, was constructed between AD 72 and AD 80, under emperors Vespasian and Titus, and then modified under Domitian. It is the largest amphitheatre built in the Roman Empire and had a seating capacity of around 50, 000. Statues once embellished its arches on all three levels. |