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Source Description
The slightly under life-size portrait is carved in a distinctive style native to Palmyra, Syria, under the Roman Empire. While the head was once part of a relief, it was carved almost fully in the round. The figure’s pursed lips are offset by protruding ears and large, stylized eyes with engraved irises and pupils. However, the figure is identifiable as a priest by his cylindrical headdress, which is divided into three sections and wrapped in a thick woven band. There are more than 3,000 Palmyrene funerary portrait sculptures currently extant. This is the largest corpus of portraiture in the Roman world outside of the city of Rome, and as such it provides valuable information about self-representation and identity in the Roman provinces.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
76362
label
Funerary Relief of a Priest
core
obj
dtoType
sculpture
citationUrl
pageCount
4
Source metadata
id
76362
sourceUrl
contentType
sculpture
stage
normalized
title
Funerary Relief of a Priest
description
The slightly under life-size portrait is carved in a distinctive style native to Palmyra, Syria, under the Roman Empire. While the head was once part of a relief, it was carved almost fully in the round. The figure’s pursed lips are offset by protruding ears and large, stylized eyes with engraved irises and pupils. However, the figure is identifiable as a priest by his cylindrical headdress, which is divided into three sections and wrapped in a thick woven band. There are more than 3,000 Palmyrene funerary portrait sculptures currently extant. This is the largest corpus of portraiture in the Roman world outside of the city of Rome, and as such it provides valuable information about self-representation and identity in the Roman provinces.
provenance
Arthur Houghton, Cockeysville, Maryland, by 1965, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 2008, by gift.
date
2nd century CE (Roman Imperial)
citationUrl
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
genreSpecific
Sculpture
sculpture (visual works)
reliefs
imageCount
4
pageCount
4
source
import
dimensions
units
cm
width
24
height
11
depth
13
dimensionsRaw
H: 9 7/16 × W: 4 5/16 × D: 5 1/8 in. (24 × 11 × 13 cm)
Source extras
cul
Palmyrene
med
limestone
creator_ids
16198
collection_ids
ANE
exhibition_ids
2002
Page inventory
seq
1
type
photo
mediaId
e00c4593a9b3791f
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no
seq
2
type
photo
mediaId
33c5183acf6f621b
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no
seq
3
type
photo
mediaId
fce746e247ec9b8b
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no
seq
4
type
photo
mediaId
b2e5fe38a89d477e
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no