Sperlonga sculptures

The Sperlonga sculptures are a large and elaborate ensemble of ancient sculptures discovered in 1957 in the grounds of the former villa of the Emperor Tiberius at Sperlonga, on the coast between Rome and Naples. As reconstructed, the sculptures were arranged in groups around the interior of a large natural grotto facing the sea used by Tiberius for dining; many scholars believe he had the sculptures installed. The groups show incidents from the story of the Homeric hero Odysseus, and are in Hellenistic "baroque" style, "a loud, full-blown baroque",^[1] but are generally thought to date to the early Imperial period.

As Tacitus and Suetonius recount,^[2] the grotto collapsed in 26 AD, nearly killing Tiberius, and either then or in a later fall the sculptures were crushed into thousands of fragments, so that the modern reconstructions have many missing elements. A museum was established in 1963 at Sperlonga to display the reconstructed sculptures and other finds from the villa, with cast reconstructions of the large groups,^[3] which are described by the classicist Mary Beard as "creative reinventions".^[4] As in the first picture here, many elements can be seen twice, as pieced-together originals, and as reconstructions using plaster casts of original pieces, filled out with educated guesswork.

As usually reconstructed, the sculptures were arranged in four main groups around an artificial circular pool occupying most of the grotto, and connecting to a larger pool outside, one on an island in the centre of the circle. At the rear of the cave and to the right was a group showing the Blinding of Polyphemus the cyclops (one-eyed giant) by Odysseus and his men, dominated by the huge figure of Polyphemus lying drunk. Forward of this, on an island in the middle of the pool, was a group showing Odysseus' ship attacked by the monster Scylla. Two smaller groups placed on the sides of the pool's opening to the main pool outside are usually interpreted as, to the left, a "Pasquino group" of Odysseus carrying the body of Achilles from the battlefield, and to the right, Odysseus about to betray Diomedes after they steal the Trojan cult image of the Palladium from Troy in the course of its siege by the Greeks.^[5]

On a niche in the cliff face above the entrance to the grotto was Ganymede carried up by the Eagle, a disguise of Zeus, apparently from the same period as the Odysseus groups. Some other statues around the grotto appear to belong both to earlier and later periods, and are excluded from the general comments here.^[6] The sculptures were designed to be seen from a triclinium or dining space with couches, presumably inside at least a tent or a "light pavilion",^[7] set on a rectangular island in the fish pond running into the grotto, and presumably also by walking round the grotto itself, and possibly bathing in the pool. They would presumably have been artificially lit, especially at night, as the rear of the grotto would have been rather dim even in daylight. The grotto was also decorated with "artificial stalactites and encrustations" as well as a coloured opus sectile floor, and a "room" left of the Polyphemus group had a number of theatrical masks mounted on the walls, designed to be lit from behind.^[8]