• 1 For the Eros statues of Phidias, Alcamenes and Praxiteles, see Corso 2004, p. 244-256; Pasquier, Ma (...)
• 2 The group is mentioned by Pausanias (II.21). See Calcani, 2009, p. 48.

1The Bronze Statue of Sleeping Eros in the Metropolitan Museum of Art (fig. 1) belongs to a long tradition of Greek Eros sculptures and in many ways is a quiet but radical departure from them. Famous statues of Eros made by major Classical sculptors would have been known to the artist who created the Metropolitan’s bronze statue of Eros sleeping. Phidias and Alcamenes both created Eros statues although relatively little is known about what the sculptures looked like1. Skopas sculpted an Eros as part of a group of statues of Eros, Pothos (Longing) and Himeros (Yearning) that was set up at a sanctuary of Aphrodite at Megara2. Callistratus, De Statuis 3, described Praxiteles’s bronze Eros at Thespiae in Boeotia as marvelously life-like, a joyous archer with an ardent gaze, large wings and easy pose that made flight seem possible. The bronze Eros by Lysippos, made ca. 338-335 B.C., also dedicated to the god at Thespiae, represented the god as a winged youth stringing his bow (fig. 2). Eros, the archer, prepares to wound. It is a momentary pose that captures the god’s double nature: desire can bring happiness or it can destroy by unsettling wisdom.

• 3 On the origins of Eros, see Breitenberger, 2007, p. 137-169. See also Hemingway, 2013, especially p (...)
• 4 See Pirenne-Delforge, Pironti, 2011, p. 41-53, especially p. 46.
• 5 “you cruel child of guileful Aphrodite, whom she bore to… Ares.” Simonides, Fragment 575 (Campbell, (...)
• 6 See, for example, Kondolean, Segal, 2011, p. 64, catalogue number 40, p. 193.

2There were many different myths about the lineage of Eros and during the Classical period another myth of Eros began to take hold3. The primordial Eros was brought into the Olympian pantheon and became the child of Aphrodite and Ares, the god of war. The myth of Aphrodite and Ares’s love affair is known as early as Homer’s Odyssey, 8.266-369, though it does not mention Eros as a result of their union. Aphrodite and Ares are associated in regional Greek sanctuaries from at least the Archaic period4. However, the earliest mention of Eros in the myth of Aphrodite and Ares appears in a fragment attributed to the 5th century B.C. poet Simonides5. It was not until the 4th century B.C., especially in the Hellenistic period, that the myth became popular. While there are a few representations of Eros as a child in Classical art, it is not until the Hellenistic period that he is predominantly portrayed as a child, which is surely a visual counterpart to the myth of Aphrodite and Ares and its literary tradition. The Sleeping Eros, certainly among the most successful images of the god from the Hellenistic period, must have significantly reinforced the myth of the union of Ares and Aphrodite bearing Eros6.

• 7 Söldner (1986, p. 596-619, catalogue numbers. 3-38) catalogues 35 examples. Four more can be added (...)
• 8 Richter, 1943, p. 377.
• 9 See Mattusch, 1996, Classical Bronzes, p. 161-163, for a summary of the many different dates within (...)
• 10 Marcadé, 1993, p. 482.
• 11 Söldner, 1986, p. 65.
• 12 Richter, 1943, p. 372-374.
• 13 Ridgway, 1990, p. 326-328.
• 14 Hemingway, 2004, p. 13.
• 15 Mattusch, 1996, Classical Bronzes, p. 165. On technical grounds alone, however, it would be highly (...)
• 16 Burn, 2004, p. 148, fig. 85.
• 17 Picón, Mertens, Milleker et al., 2007, p. 451, no. 240; Hemingway, 2007, p. 50, fig. 1, p. 54-55.

3The Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros is the finest example of its kind. In a careful study of the representations of Sleeping Eros, Magdalene Söldner catalogued 349 examples dating from as early as the 3rd century B.C. to the 4th century A.D. The vast majority of the works in bronze, marble and terracotta are from the Roman Imperial period. Söldner identified eleven different variations of Sleeping Eros and the type associated with the Metropolitan’s bronze statue appears to be the earliest. There exist nearly forty replicas of this particular variant, which is known as the New York type after the Museum’s statue7. The Metropolitan’s statue has been considered the original or a Hellenistic original by Gisela Richter in an important article in the American Journal of Archaeology in 1943, and has been dated to between 250-150 B.C.8 Many scholars generally agree with Richter’s assessment but often argue for different dates within the Hellenistic period9. Jean Marcadé, for example, dates it not later than the middle of the 3rd century B.C. citing similarities to the Barberini Faun especially its open composition and the torsion of its torso10. Magdalene Söldner argues for an even earlier date between 270-260 B.C.11 The naturalism of the Sleeping Eros compares with other Hellenistic sculptures of the 3rd or 2nd century B.C. such as the Baker Dancer and the prototype of the Old Market Woman known from a number of copies of the Early Imperial period, and sleep becomes a popular theme in large-scale sculptures during the first centuries of the Hellenistic period. Indeed, numerous scholars from Richter12 to Ridgway13 have made nuanced comparisons in an effort to narrow the date of the Metropolitan’s bronze statue of Sleeping Eros. The problem lies in the fact that there are relatively few securely dated Hellenistic sculptures and Hellenistic sculptors borrowed freely from the styles of previous periods. The precise dating of most Hellenistic sculptures is difficult unless the work is tied to a particular historical event14. Carol Mattusch cautions dating the Metropolitan’s statue precisely, suggesting that “we can only tentatively conclude that the Eros is no earlier in date than the Hellenistic period, and we can make no assumptions about how late it might be15.” Lucilla Burn, in her recent book on Hellenistic art, suggests that it could date to the Hellenistic or Roman period16. When the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros was installed in the new Hellenistic and Roman galleries in 2007, it was dated very broadly as a Hellenistic work or a particularly fine Roman copy of the Augustan period17. The technical analysis presented in this paper supports the identification of the Metropolitan’s statue as a Hellenistic work, and stylistic analysis only allows a broad date of the 3rd century or 2nd century B.C.

• 18 On the Colossus, see Haynes, 1992, p. 121-128; Clayton, Price, 1989, p. 124-137; Smith, 1991, p. 24 (...)
• 19 On the Hellenistic sculpture of Rhodes, see Merker, 1973; Machaira, 2011; Mattusch, 1998, p. 149-15 (...)
• 20 See Zimmer, Hackländer, 1997; Gerlach, 2002, especially p. 16-27, figs. 1-2, 11.
• 21 Hemingway, Milleker, Stone, 2002, p. 200-207.

4The Metropolitan Museum of Art acquired the Sleeping Eros in 1943 from the New York dealer Joseph Brummer, who had purchased it in Paris in 1930 from the Greek dealer E. Gelidakis. It is said to have come from the island of Rhodes. While it is not possible to confirm this provenance it is nonetheless worth considering. Rhodes was a famous place for bronze working in the Hellenistic period, home to one of the seven wonders of the ancient world; the Colossus, a giant Early Hellenistic bronze statue of the sun god Helios, towered over the harbor of its main town18. Recent excavations on Rhodes have unearthed evidence of Hellenistic bronze foundries, but there is very little extant large-scale bronze sculpture from that period on the island, which compares to the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros19. One of the few comparanda is a statue in the Antikensammlungen in Berlin known as the Praying Youth that is likely an Early Hellenistic work. It depicts an athlete, either a runner or jumper, who was victorious in the games20. In the Metropolitan’s collection, a very fine Early Imperial portrait statue of an aristocratic boy, also said to come from Rhodes, demonstrates that very high quality bronze sculpture continued to be made on Rhodes into the Augustan Age21.

• 22 See Mattusch, 1996, The Fire of Hephaistos, p. 182-184, illustrated; see also Azema et al. in this (...)
• 23 See Richter, 1943, p. 371, fig. 7 for an image of the statue prior to cleaning. This work was carri (...)
• 24 Richter (1943, p. 370) only identified 5 of these sections. She had not noticed the joins in the le (...)

6In antiquity, all known large-scale bronze statues were piece-cast and then the parts were typically welded together22. The statue of Sleeping Eros in the Metropolitan is no exception as it was cast in pieces that were then joined together. While burial accretions on the exterior of the statue were removed prior to its acquisition by the Museum, accretions on the interior were left in situ²³. The statue is open at the bottom and as such offers unusual access to its interior (fig. 3). Careful visual examination combined with X-radiography and selective cleaning of the interior surface enabled the identification of all the cast sections of the statue and the locations of where the pieces were joined together. The statue, as it is preserved today, was made in seven pieces: head, body with left wing, left arm, right wing, left leg, right leg and the drapery (fig. 4)24. It is interesting to note that the seven separately cast sections are all roughly equal in size, giving, it would seem, a sense of the amount of metal preferred for a pour in the foundry that cast the statue. Ancient foundries needed to limit the size of the cast sections because of their limitations for melting and keeping molten large quantities of metal.

• 25 The thickness of the bronze in the body is typically between 3-5 mm. In places such as the break in (...)

8The fact that most of the interior of the statue adheres closely to the form of its exterior is indicative of the indirect lost wax casting process25. However, an X-radiograph of the head shows that the fine curls of hair are solid and would thus have been worked in wax and then applied to the figure (fig. 5). This is individualized work that would have been unique to the sculpture.

• 26 The chaplet hole in the head and abdomen are 3.4 mm x 3.4 mm. A second chaplet hole in the body nea (...)
• 27 This part of the drapery still has a layer of burial accretion on its underside.
• 28 See Mattusch, 1996, The Fire of Hephaistos, p. 279, fig. 35n.

9Square core pin holes are visible in X-radiographs and on the interior of the head, body, legs and drapery (fig. 6)26. Narrow fins around the pin holes on the interior indicate that the core pins were most likely heated and pushed through the wax model from the exterior. There also appears to be a plug in the proper left big toe, which may have been a place where core material was introduced (see fig. 6). During the cleaning of the interior body, two small fragments of the clay core were identified adhering to the interior, confirming that clay was used as the core material. However, small globules of metal on the interior of the drapery between the legs, visible in the X-radiograph, indicate that the core for this cast section was in a liquid state when it was poured into the mold and given their fineness likely indicate that plaster was used for the core of this section27. Similar hemispherical nodules caused by bubbles in liquid core material have been identified on a Late Hellenistic or Early Imperial statue of Artemis formerly in the collection of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in Buffalo, New York28.

• 29 The hammered patch measures 12.3 mm x 10.5 mm.

10The bronze is a very fine casting that exhibits few flaws. A single hammered patch on the upper chest below his quiver strap is rectangular in shape and typical of ancient Greek bronze craftsmanship (fig. 7)29. An unusual technical feature is located on the interior of the torso near where the left arm was joined; it looks as though the sculptor made a repair in the wax.

• 30 The channel is 53.4 mm long and 5.1-5.5 mm wide.
• 31 Mertens (1985, p. 52) also notes that the way the statue “was made shows that it had a separate bas (...)
• 32 Hellenistic bronze sculptors were known to use other materials in their bronze sculptures to make t (...)

11A horizontal groove cut into the lower wing, probably done after the statue was cast and pieced together, appears to be a mechanical join that was used to fit it onto its base (fig. 8)30. The base on which the figure is displayed today is modern. However, the finished cast edge evident on much of the underside of the statue and the groove (fig. 8) suggest that the original base was made of another material31. Stone is the most likely candidate as it would have added to the life-like appearance of the sculpture32. Chisel gashes along the interior of the proper left wing are another possible indication of the statue being fitted onto its base (fig. 9). Like the groove in the lower wing (fig. 8), the chiseling appears to be cold working on the bronze statue in the final stages of its preparation for display.

• 33 Bronze head of Sleeping Eros from Volubilis, Roman copy, 1st or 2nd c. A.D., Rabat Archaeological M (...)
• 34 The body of the bronze Eros from Epiais-Rhus was first discovered in 1961 in a second-century A.D. (...)
• 35 A particularly well-preserved example of Hypnos is the small statue in the collection of Shelby Whi (...)

12There are only two other known large-scale bronze Sleeping Eros statues and they are much more fragmentary. The first is a head from Volubilis, the ancient capital of Mauretania, and now in the Rabat Archaeological Museum, Morocco. It probably dates to the 1st century A.D. Its original context is not known but it has been suggested that it may have been part of a sculpture that decorated a tomb33. The second example is a second-century A.D. reclining body of Eros with wings that comes from a Roman villa at Epiais Rhus France (Val d’Oise), now in the collection of the Louvre34. Although both examples were piece-cast by the lost wax method, they are stylistically and technically distinct from the Metropolitan’s statue. They exhibit a thick cast edge where the head joins the neck, which can be compared to other Late Hellenistic and Roman sculptures, such as the bronze sculptures of Hypnos in the British Museum and the collection of Shelby White and Leon Levy, the statue known as the Youth from Salamis, and the head of an athlete in the DeMenil Collection in Fort Worth35.

• 36 The other high lead sample (sample 6) was taken from an excrescence on the interior of the left leg (...)

13Seven samples were taken from various parts of the interior of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros. These samples were subjected to quantitative analysis using energy dispersive and wavelength dispersive X-ray spectrometry in the scanning electron microscope (SEM-EDS/WDS) in order to determine the alloy compositions. The work was carried out by Mark Wypyski in The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Department of Scientific Research. The chemical analyses from different parts of the statue revealed some surprising results (see Table 1). The samples fell into two categories. Most of the samples were typical tin bronzes with trace levels of impurities, and little or no lead, as is well represented in a polished metallographic section of sample number two taken from inside the head (fig. 10). The grain structure is clearly visible; the brighter areas represent the higher tin phases while the small white globules are traces of lead. However, two of the samples were leaded tin bronzes with a high concentration of lead, between 18-19%, as illustrated in sample number three, which came from the drapery between the legs36. In the metallographic section of this sample, all of the bright areas are mostly lead (fig. 11). Interestingly, the sample from the join between the head and body contained 2% more tin. This differentiation may represent a slightly more fluid alloy used to weld the two pieces together if the variation is not due to greater oxidation of the sample. Another sample from the join at the neck and a sample from the weld metal between the left leg and body did not register any significant differences from the alloy used to cast the head and body. Cast sections that were not sampled (the left arm, right wing, and left and right legs) were examined by means of a non-destructive X-ray fluorescence unit. All were found to be tin bronzes of a similar alloy to the head and body. Using the XRF unit, it was possible to identify clearly where the leaded drapery joins the unleaded drapery on the figure, which continues under much of the body at the back and demonstrates clearly that the drapery was part of the original composition. The join is also clear in an X-radiograph that distinguishes the more opaque leaded metal from the less opaque unleaded tin bronze. Even though the thickness of the bronze is consistent, the density of the lead appears more opaque in x-radiographs (fig. 12). The drapery may have been cast onto the figure since there is no clear evidence of excess metal from a weld except a spongy excrescence inside the left leg that flows from the join between the leg and drapery.

• 37 On the alloy of Hellenistic bronze sculptures, see Mille et al., 2012, fig 34; Hemingway, 2004, p.  (...)

14The head, body and other parts of the figure are regular tin bronzes, typical for an ancient Greek bronze sculpture of the Hellenistic period, while the drapery between the legs contains high quantities of lead, more like what one would expect of an Imperial Roman bronze sculpture37. While it is necessary to be cautious when interpreting alloy results, this variation and the apparent difference in the kind of core material used between these cast sections require some explanation. The statue may have been damaged in antiquity and then repaired at a later date, possibly in Early Imperial times when large quantities of lead commonly were added to the alloys of large-scale sculptures.

• 38 Giustozzi, 2007, p. 47.
• 39 Although the naturalistic wings of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros, which lie closed like a bird’s (...)

15The Metropolitan’s statue of Sleeping Eros is remarkably well preserved (see fig. 1). It sits so well on its modern base and has become such an icon in and of itself that it is possible to forget that it lacks some parts. Besides the base, the left arm, several parts of the drapery, the quiver and bow are all missing. Careful examination of the statue in relation to other replicas from the series enables a fairly clear reconstruction of the missing parts. The closest copy to the Metropolitan’s statue is a marble statue in the Palazzo Clementino of the Capitoline Museums (fig. 13), which was found in Rome and is dated to the 2nd century A.D.38 Despite its later date, the Capitoline figure closely compares with the Metropolitan’s statue, particularly the position of the figure and the drapery on which the child god sleeps. However, notable differences include the hair style and the Capitoline Eros’s more dynamic wings with the quiver strapped to his back between them, which is a popular variant of the type39.

• 40 For the statue from Paphos, see Söldner, 1986, p. 606, catalogue number 18. For the statue from Del (...)
• 41 The pose is reversed and the drapery simplified. See Hemingway, 2002, p. 27, illustrated; Hemingway (...)

16Importantly, the well-preserved drapery between the legs of both statues is especially close (figs. 14-15). Both sculptures exhibit the same complex drapery pattern that must stem from the same prototype. The drapery of the Capitoline Sleeping Eros, however, is not as finely rendered. There are no press folds or fine selvage, nor is the knot at the corner preserved. Given the clear relationship between the existing drapery between the legs of the New York Sleeping Eros and the Sleeping Eros in the Palazzo Clementini, the other areas of drapery well-preserved on the Sleeping Eros in the Palazzo Clementini ought to provide a good indication of how to reconstruct the missing drapery of the New York Sleeping Eros. In fact, the line of drapery below the belly also corresponds closely. A small fragment of drapery on the front of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros can be compared to the placement of drapery on the Sleeping Eros in the Palazzo Clementini, which has a mass of drapery folds below the head bunched like a pillow and hanging down over the missing rock. A few other replicas in the New York Sleeping Eros replica series also appear to copy this drapery although less exactly. These include a first-century A.D. marble statue of Sleeping Eros from Paphos on Cyprus and a marble statue in the Delphi Archaeological Museum, which is dated to the early 2nd century A.D. and was once used as a fountain40. The drapery scheme is also replicated in small-scale versions, like the first- or second-century A.D. bronze statuette in the Metropolitan’s collection41.

• 42 A preliminary sketch line for the quiver strap is visible beneath the wing. It must be something li (...)
• 43 The golden tipped arrows of Eros were said to have dove feathers, while the lead tipped arrows had (...)
• 44 See Söldner, 1986, p. 603-604, catalogue number 15, figs. 20-21.

17The placement of the left arm of the Capitoline Sleeping Eros provides a clear picture of what the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros’s missing arm would have looked like although the quiver would have also been placed by the left arm. It is notable that the quiver strap crosses the front of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros like the Capitoline Sleeping Eros but then differs. It does not continue between the wings to meet the quiver which instead was placed near the head42. The feather of an arrow preserved by the head of the New York Sleeping Eros makes clear that the quiver was originally open, a more complicated rendering since each arrow would have been sculpted individually43. The open quiver adds to the sense of immediacy in the bronze statue. His bow was in hand and the quiver ready for use when Eros fell asleep. An open quiver appears on a few other examples from the replica series such as an Early Imperial marble copy in the Residenzmuseum in Munich44.

• 45 An elaborate quiver appears on a Lysippan replica from Gabii in the collection of the Rome National (...)
• 46 See Söldner, 1986, p. 65-75, especially the example in the Louvre, fig. 45, which also has the quiv (...)

18What would the quiver of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros have looked like? It may have been ornate with relief decoration as occurs in some figures of Eros, or it may well have been of a simpler design like the quiver of the Capitoline Sleeping Eros45. Although none of the other Sleeping Eros statues of the New York type preserve the quiver by the head like the one in the Metropolitan, in many of the examples the quiver is simply not preserved at all. There is a later type of Sleeping Eros, known as the Broadlands type, which also has the quiver placed off the body and near the head46.

• 47 Safarik, Zeri, 1990, p. 154-155, no. 85, illustrated. I am grateful to the Colonna family and their (...)

19Relatively few of the extant replicas of the New York type preserve their bows, but two statues in Roman collections give some sense of what the bow of the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros may have looked like and its general placement. A marble sculpture in the Vatican restored in the eighteenth century, although missing the right hand and central part of the bow, is preserved well enough to see that the bow lies just below the right hand, which may have grasped its lower part as it is now restored. In another Imperial copy in the Galleria Colonna in Rome, the bow lies on the ground near the rock and Eros’s hand is over the grip47. The Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros would have had a similar small bow that matched the scale of its owner. In the Metropolitan’s statue, however, the bow appears to have slipped from Eros’s hand, coming to rest against the rock on which he is sleeping.

• 48 On representations of sleeping figures in vase paintings from the Classical period, see McNally, 19 (...)
• 49 Ridgway (1990, p. 313-318, pl. 157) also suggests it is a Roman work in a Hellenistic mode.
• 50 Sorbella, 2007, “A Satyr for Midas”, p. 219-248.
• 51 See Sorbella, 2007, “A Satyr for Midas”, p. 245.

20Images of figures sleeping occur in small-scale sculptures and vase paintings of the Classical period. Especially popular at the time were scenes of sleeping maenads being approached by satyrs, such as depicted on an Attic red-figure lekythos attributed to Polion. The vase represents a naughty satyr peaking under the chiton of one sleeping maenad (fig. 16)48. There is a significant shift in the Hellenistic period, when artists began to explore various aspects of sleep in large-scale sculptures. These works were part of a trend in Hellenistic art that favored realism and new representations of cognitive thought ably expressed in portraits of historic individuals as well as mythological figures. A magnificent example is the Barberini Faun, which may well be an original Pergamene Greek sculpture of the 3rd or 2nd century B.C., if it is not a fine Roman copy49. It was found near Hadrian’s Mausoleum in Rome in the 17th century. As with the Sleeping Eros, the viewer becomes a voyeur in the scene, which here has strong Dionysian and sexual overtones. An intriguing recent interpretation identifies the sleeping satyr as the one that wily King Midas captured after it had drunk from a spring spiked with potent wine50. The satyr’s exposed pose and not completely restful sleep may foreshadow his imminent capture, and the channels conducting water through the rock on which he sits recreated the spring from which he drank. The work may have been commissioned by a Hellenistic king ruling over Phrygia, such as Antiochos IV Epiphanes, who may have wanted to be associated with Midas51.

• 52 See Ridgway, 1990, p. 330-332.
• 53 Haskell, Penny, 1981, p. 184-187.
• 54 See McNally, 1985, p. 152-192.

21Another major type of sleeping figure is the Sleeping Ariadne. The original is thought to be the work of a Pergamene artist dated to the 3rd or 2nd century B.C.52 Known from two large-scale marble copies and several variants, the most famous example is the statue in the Vatican, a Hadrianic copy found in Rome in 151253. The statue represents Ariadne in a troubled sleep, for when she wakes up she will find that her lover Theseus has abandoned her on the island of Naxos. The statue is also strongly within the Dionysian sphere as, according to the myth, Ariadne wakes to find the god Dionysos, who falls in love with her and takes her as his wife54.

• 55 See Stafford, 1993, p. 11-112; Kondolean, Segal, 2011, p. 128-129, 204, no. 121. On the Roman copie (...)
• 56 See Smith, 1991, p. 133-134; Clayton, Price, 1989, p. 124-137.
• 57 Stewart, 1997, p. 230.

22Even more surprising is the Sleeping Hermaphrodite, thought to have first been produced in the 3rd or 2nd century B.C. and known in a number of marble copies55. Like the Barberini Faun, the Sleeping Ariadne and the Sleeping Eros, the Sleeping Hermaphrodite can stand alone and need not belong to a group. As with the Ariadne, he is in a troubled sleep indicated by the way he shifts his weight from one side to the other. Indeed, scholars have suggested that the ancient viewer may have initially believed that he was gazing upon a Sleeping Ariadne56. The Sleeping Hermaphrodite is highly erotic from one side, he looks like a beautiful woman, but from the other side he exposes his male genitalia. This theatrical dual presentation brings the viewer into the experience but with unexpected results. One scholar has identified the figure as the androgynous offspring of Zeus and Agdis, Agdistis, who so misbehaved that Dionysos eventually got him drunk and castrated him57.

• 58 Ashmole, Beazley, 1932, p. 84; Ashmole, 1922, p. 244-247, fig. 10, pl. X.
• 59 See, for example, Hermary, Cassinatis, 1986, “Éros endormi”, LIMC, III.1, 1986, p. 916.
• 60 Pollitt (1986, p. 149) remains uncertain of the original statue’s significance, but suggests that i (...)

23Bernard Ashmole has noted similarities between the Sleeping Hermaphrodite and the Sleeping Eros copy in the Capitoline Museums in Rome and argued that they both represent works by the same sculptor, Polykles, mentioned by Pliny (NH 34.80) as the creator of a famous Hermaphrodite58. A significant part of Ashmole’s argument is based on the treatment of the hair, which differs for the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros, and many scholars have not found his argument convincing59. Nor is the attribution of the Sleeping Hermaphrodite type represented by the copy in the Palazzo Massimo to the Athenian sculptor Polykles certain since Pliny’s reference is just to a statue of a Hermaphrodite not a Sleeping Hermaphrodite and other statues of Hermaphrodites are known. Although the connection with Dionysos is not made explicit in the sculpture, Hermaphrodite is represented elsewhere in Dionysian revels and scholars often assert that this sculpture should be seen as assimilating into the Dionysian sphere60.

• 61 Other sculptures of sleeping figures from the Hellenistic period include a marble relief of a drunk (...)
• 62 See Vlachogianni, 2012, p. 69-70.

24A spectacular monumental Late Hellenistic sculpture is the Blinding of Polyphemus from the Grotto of Tiberius at Sperlonga. Here the Cyclops, like the Barberini Faun, is shown in a deep drunken sleep, the dangers of which are apparent as Odysseus and his band prepare to blind him and escape from his cave. The sculpture was likely made for the Grotto and is dated to the end of the 1st century B.C.61 However, large-scale marble statues representing more than one scene from the Homeric cycle were part of the cargo of the Antikythera shipwreck, indicating that such monumental groups were being made already in the first half of the 1st century B.C.62

• 63 Descamps-Lequime, 2011, p. 546, catalogue no. 341, illustrated. See also Stampolidis, Tassoulas, 20 (...)
• 64 Hemingway, 2004, p. 17.

26The Sleeping Eros is different from other representations of sleeping figures since it represents a major deity. To be sure ancient Greeks believed that Sleep could conquer the gods – as in Homer’s Iliad, 8.27-32, where Hypnos has power even over Zeus. However, the gods were not often represented as asleep in Greek art. The original Sleeping Eros statue, which, in fact, may be the Metropolitan’s bronze sculpture, would have been considered at the time it was made, most likely sometime in the 3rd century B.C., a startling new and ingenious composition for a large-scale representation of the god of love. Eros is represented as sleeping in earlier small-scale works, such as a late fourth-century B.C. terracotta from a child’s tomb at Pella in northern Greece63. The inclusion of a Sleeping Eros terracotta statuette among other funerary objects interred with the dead occurs again in the Hellenistic period at Myrina in the 1st century B.C. (fig. 17). The Myrina Sleeping Eros statuette relates to the New York Sleeping Eros type – the Eros lies in a similar pose on a rock covered with drapery, yet it has quite a different feel. It includes a downturned torch, an attribute of Eros that has strong funerary connotations. It is apparent, therefore, that the Sleeping Eros as a metaphor of eternal sleep (death) and eternal love was utilized already in the Hellenistic period for burial offerings even though it was only in the Roman Imperial period that the Sleeping Eros became a popular tomb marker. The Hellenistic terracotta statuettes of Sleeping Eros placed in tombs represent a very different context from the large-scale statue since funerary monuments of the Hellenistic period were not typically made of bronze64.

• 65 Hemingway, 2005, p. 38.

27A small terracotta sculpture in the Metropolitan’s collection presents a very different image of Eros sleeping. It takes the conceit of depicting Eros as a sleeping baby and turns it on its head, a Hellenistic caricature of Eros as an old man. Here Eros is represented as ravaged by time with nothing of the purity of love and innocence evident in the Metropolitan’s bronze statue of Sleeping Eros. Rather, it seems to be a comical commentary on love grown old – a curmudgeon with a huge phallus inserted separately but now missing65.

• 66 Söldner (1986, p. 291-305) suggests it may have been a fountain sculpture in a Dionysian park. On r (...)
• 67 It can be compared to other major dedications of bronze statues such as the famous charioteer from (...)
• 68 See The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, accession numbers 74.51.1595, 74.51.1598, 74.51.1597, (...)
• 69 Vlachopoulos, 2006, p. 90-91, fig. 103.

28There are a variety of possible contexts for a bronze statue like the Sleeping Eros in the Hellenistic period. It may have been set up in a public park, as is known to have existed on Rhodes in the Hellenistic period, or even in a royal garden66. To the modern viewer, the Metropolitan’s sculpture of Sleeping Eros may look decorative, but its large scale and high quality make a solely decorative function unlikely in the Hellenistic period. More likely, it is a religious sculpture that was dedicated at a sanctuary as an offering to the gods67. While there are not many major cult sanctuaries to Eros known in Greece, like the one at Thespiae in Boeotia, Eros was worshipped in conjunction with other deities, especially Aphrodite, and a statue of Eros could have been dedicated to her, as well as the god himself. Given the prevalence of the myth of Aphrodite as the mother of Eros in the Hellenistic period, a statue of Eros as a baby may have been seen as especially appropriate. Numerous small-scale terracotta votives representing Eros have been found in Greek sanctuaries. The Metropolitan’s Cesnola Collection includes terracotta statuettes of Eros from sanctuaries to Aphrodite, Apollo and Artemis on Cyprus68. Religious sculptures intended to delight the gods can appear decorative, especially if their original context is not known. For example, at first glance a Late Hellenistic marble statuette of Aphrodite riding a dolphin appears to be a decorative work but, in fact, it is an ex voto from the sanctuary of Poseidon on Thasos where Aphrodite was also worshipped69.

• 70 Corso, 2007, p. 9-9-186, and for the list of 335 extant replicas p. 206-230.
• 71 See Christie’s 2012. p. 138, lot 288 illustrated, a gilt silver bowl whose central medallion has a (...)

29A particularly instructive comparison for the Sleeping Eros is the famous Aphrodite of Knidos by Praxiteles. Considered by Pliny the Elder (A.D. 23-79) to be the finest statue in the world, it was created as a religious work, a cult statue set up in a round temple at Knidos in the 4th century B.C. Highly innovative for its nude representation of the goddess, it is known in over three hundred sculptural copies and variants70. Like the Knidian Aphrodite, the Sleeping Eros originally would have been a religious image that became tremendously popular – adapted for a variety of public and private uses as images of religious devotion or decorative garden sculptures. The image of Sleeping Eros adapted well to the minor arts, which added to its widespread circulation. It appears, for example, as a decorative device on a Hellenistic gilt silver bowl of the 2nd century B.C.71

• 72 See Petriaggi, 2003; Pasquier, Martinez, 2007, p. 284-291; Andreae, 2009, p. 7-80.
• 73 Pasquier, Martinez (2007, 284) suggest 4th c. B.C. or 2nd-1st c. B.C. Andreae argues it is an origi (...)
• 74 See, for example, a Roman terracotta plaque with a dancing satyr and maenad, Augustan or Julio-Clau (...)
• 75 See Scribner, 1991, p. 118, pl. 38, p. 90-93, pl. 25.

30Another useful comparison is a remarkable bronze statue of a dancing satyr in Mazara del Vallo, Sicily72. Scholars disagree on its date but the sculpture is arguably a Greek bronze of the late 4th or 3rd century B.C., and was probably originally made as a dedication at a sanctuary73. Despite its wild ecstatic pose, the sculpture maintains a reverence that would have been essential to a religious work and its dedicator. This kind of dancing satyr also became a very popular type in later Hellenistic Dionysian and Roman Bacchic imagery74. The explicit sensuality of the Dancing Satyr of Mazara del Vallo compares with the bold religious sculptures by the seventeenth-century Roman master Gian Lorenzo Bernini such as the ecstasy of Beata Lodovica Albertoni in the church of San Francesco al Ripa and the ecstasy of Santa Teresa in Cornaro Chapel of Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome75. Brilliant sculptors, who have to work within the confines of their commissions, still manage to create startlingly original compositions. Like the Knidian Aphrodite and the Dancing Satyr of Mazara del Vallo, the sculptor of the original Sleeping Eros created a bold new composition, but one that remained within the strictures of religious dedications.

• 76 See Richter, 1943, p. 372.
• 77 On the myth, see Rose, 1959, p. 286-287. C.S. Lewis wrote a particularly poignant version of the my (...)
• 78 See Mansuelli, 1958, p. 140, fig. 110.

32Love was a popular theme in bucolic poetry of the Hellenistic age. There are even several references in the Palatine Anthology to sleeping Eros statues, and the need for silence so as not to wake the child. An epigram by Statilius Flaccus, dated to the 1st century B.C. refers cautiously to a Sleeping Eros statue76. There is no doubt that most ancient viewers who came upon the Sleeping Eros statue would have immediately thought of the myth of Eros and Psyche, the personification of the human soul, whose story hinges upon a sleeping Eros. In fact, the myth may have been inspiration for the artist who conceived of the Sleeping Eros statue. The connection between Eros and Psyche can be traced back to the Classical philosopher Plato and his ideas on the human soul, as they are set out in Phaedrus, where Psyche acquires wings thanks to Eros. The two mythological beings represent the perfect union of divine love and the human soul. The earliest written account of the story of Eros and Psyche is that of Apulius in The Golden Ass, IV.28-VI.24, from the second half of the 2nd century A.D., although the tale is much older than that. In fact, the image of the child Sleeping Eros was sometimes adapted to illustrate Apulius’s account77. Interestingly, the myth of Cupid and Psyche is referenced explicitly in one variant of the New York Sleeping Eros type – an Early Imperial Roman marble statue in the Uffizi in Florence (fig. 18), in which a sleeping butterfly rests next to sleeping cupid78. The monument is thought to have been a tomb marker. Instead of a bow Cupid holds a bunch of poppy seed capsules in his left hand. Although the figure has sometimes been identified as Somnus or Sleep, the inclusion of the butterfly makes clear that it is Cupid.

• 79 See Vlachogianni, 2012, p. 70, and see P. Bougia’s contribution in this volume.
• 80 See Exhib., The Spinario, 2005. See also La Rocca, Presicce, Lo Monaco, 2010, p. 302-303.
• 81 On the numerous examples of pillage of Greek works by Roman armies during wars of the Hellenistic p (...)
• 82 See Corso, 2010, p. 88-103.
• 83 See Mattusch, 2005, especially p. 12-19. See also Zanker, 2008, p. 11-21.

33Of particular interest for understanding the ancient history of the Met’s Sleeping Eros statue are the new results of metallurgical and technical analyses, which indicate that the statue was repaired in antiquity. As there have been few detailed scientific analyses of the cast sections of ancient bronzes there are not many specific parallels to point to, although it is not surprising that such repairs were made in antiquity. The bronze statues of philosophers from the Antikythera shipwreck have some repairs that may have been made long after their initial creation. The statues are considered to be Early Hellenistic Greek works that were being transported from an eastern port such as Delos, Pergamon, or even Ephesos to the West in the 1st century B.C.79 More frequent are later variants of popular types like the bronze statue known as the Spinario in the Capitoline Museum in Rome whose body conforms closely to a Hellenistic prototype but whose hair and face reflect the Augustan period in which it was made80. If the Metropolitan’s Sleeping Eros was created in the 3rd or 2nd century B.C. and restored at a much later date, it may well have had more than one ancient context. It may have remained a dedication at a sanctuary, or it may have been removed from that context and entered a private or imperial collection of art. Thousands of major Greek sculptures were looted from sanctuaries and other civic spaces of Greek city-states during the Hellenistic period81. Romans paid tremendous sums for Greek sculptures and, at times, would go to extraordinary lengths to acquire them. In Cicero’s prosecution of Verres, the notorious Roman governor of Sicily, he notes that Verres stole a marble statue of Eros by Praxiteles from a Roman villa in Messana82. Cicero’s description of the villa of Gaius Heius of Messana and its rich collection of Greek sculptures, including some set up as private cult statues within shrines created in the home, give a sense of the wealth of such private Roman collections of Greek sculptures and their display. The Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum is the best known example of an ancient Roman villa in which many of the sculptures in bronze and marble were recovered through excavation. A wide variety of Greek commemorative and votive sculptures appealed to the owner of the villa who incorporated them into decorative displays in many parts of his country estate83.

• 84 Greek Anthology 9.586 and 9.587.
• 85 Söldner, 1986, p. 742, catalogue number 318, figs. 39-41.
• 86 Söldner, 1986, p. 606-607, catalogue number 19. This statuette was missing from the storerooms of t (...)
• 87 See Sorbella, 2007, “Eros and the Lizard”, p. 353-370.

34To judge from the number of replicas, the Sleeping Eros and its many adaptations and variations – as Sleeping Cupids and even Somnus, the Roman personification of sleep – were especially popular in the Roman Imperial period. Particularly notable are the wide variety of contexts in which these sculptures were displayed. As in the Hellenistic period, statues of Sleeping Eros continued to be offered as dedications at sanctuaries, but they also decorated Roman public baths, fountains and private villas. Two late epigrams added to the Palatine Anthology refer to a Sleeping Eros sculpture as part of a group with a satyr, which decorated a fountain, the sound of whose waters helped the child sleep84. Small-scale statuettes provided an alternative to those who could not afford or did not desire a large-scale statue. The pose of a Sleeping Eros could easily be adapted according to a client’s desires, such as a small-scale bronze statuette from Pompeii that likely decorated a private home85. Another small-scale marble excavated in a taverna at Ostia, the port city of Rome, surely served a decorative function86. The type was well-suited for funerary use and Sleeping Eros/Cupid sculptures became popular tomb monuments, especially those made for children87. The image was adapted for a wide variety of uses from its appearance in relief on sarcophagi, marble urns, and altars to mosaics, wall paintings, gold jewelry, terracotta lamps, and an array of other objects.

• 88 Unfortunately, his sculpture is lost today. See Norton, 1957, 251-257; Rubenstein, 1986, p. 257-259 (...)
• 89 Posèq, 1990, p. 162.
• 90 Cropper, 1991, p. 199-201.

35The recovery of ancient sculptures in the Italian Renaissance period, works such as the Laocoon found in the Roman emperor Nero’s Golden House in the early 16th century, inspired artists like Michelangelo to adapt classical styles to their own work. The Sleeping Eros was among the earliest types rediscovered and it is known that Michelangelo even made one, which he passed off as an ancient sculpture88. Sleeping Eros was the subject of numerous figural studies by Renaissance and Baroque artists in Italy who were looking to the classical tradition for inspiration. Undoubtedly, the most interesting later adaptation of the Sleeping Eros statue is Caravaggio’s Sleeping Cupid painted in Malta in 1608 and now in the Pitti Palace, Florence (fig. 19). It has been interpreted as an allegorical figure of the conquest of carnal passion. While the painting has been argued to be “a token of a great Platonic passion”, the dark pigments and Caravaggio’s representation of the child as a boy of the gutters may instead signify the death of love89. The figure’s pose clearly looks to the ancient type, which was also a popular subject in seventeenth-century Italian poetry90. The appearance and evocation of Caravaggio’s Sleeping Cupid could not be more different from the Metropolitan’s ancient bronze sculpture of the Sleeping Eros.