Detail View: The AMICA Library: Fragment of a Sarcophagus
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AMICA ID:
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AIC_.1983.584
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AMICA Library Year:
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1998
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Object Type:
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Sculpture
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Creator Nationality:
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European; Southern European; Roman
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Creator Dates/Places:
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Roman Republic and Empire
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Creator Name-CRT:
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Roman
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Title:
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Fragment of a Sarcophagus
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Title Type:
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preferred
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View:
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full view
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Creation Date:
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Imperial Period, 240/250 A.D
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Creation Start Date:
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240
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Creation End Date:
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250
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Materials and Techniques:
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Marble
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Subject Description:
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This fragment appears to show the heroes grouped around Meleager at the time of the hunt for the Calydonian boar. Atalanta sits at the right, and Herakles is seated with his club at the left. Meleager, standing with his foot on a rock between two other companions, has been made to resemble the heroic or divine Macedonian king, Alexander the Great. Perhaps this is because the scene on the sarcophagus was based on a painting of the period around 300 to 200 B.C. in which Meleager's hunt and tragic death were equated with Alexander the Great's conquests and his own untimely demise at Babylon in 323 B.C. Alexander was a great hunter as well as a great general, and his life ended by decree of the Fates, the same three sisters who had doomed Meleager to die by hitching his thread of life to a firebrand.
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Creation Place:
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Early Western World,Roman Republic and Empire
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Dimensions:
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W.: 96 cm (37-5/16 in.); W.: 130.5 cm (51-3/8 in); D. 22 cm (8-5/8 in.)
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AMICA Contributor:
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The Art Institute of Chicago
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Owner Location:
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Chicago, Illinois, USA
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ID Number:
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1983.584
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Credit Line:
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The Art Institute of Chicago, Gift of the Alsdorf Foundation
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Rights:
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Related Image Identifier Link:
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AIC_.E28260.TIF
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