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Ritratti di Leptis Magna: modelli, produzione, contesto tra la dinastia flavia e gli Antonini1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 November 2014
Abstract
Different types of marble portraits are discussed: both official Imperial images as well as private portraits, with the intention of illustrating the relationship to Roman models and to highlight stylistic and technical characteristics belonging to local sculptors. The portraits belonged to honourific statues dedicated in Lepcis Magna in public prestigious areas (Old Forum, Theatre, Serapeum, Hadrianic Baths). In these public meeting places the Imperial government officials, civic authorities and the private evergetes had the opportunity of celebrating the central power and its representatives, from the Emperor and the members of his family to provincial functionaries; personal aspirations of Romanisation and of making a political and administrative career; one's own generosity, personal wealth, preeminent role in civic society, as well as accumulating honours, visibility and social prestige. In the case of some statues of private individuals it is uncertain whether they were intended to be honourific or funerary. The chronological span, extending from the Flavian to the end of the Antonine period, corresponds to the period of greatest social stability and economic prosperity in Tripolitania and in Lepcis Magna in particular. From the analysis carried out, certain distinctive traits of Lepcitan portraiture between the first and second century AD emerge. The influence of the Graeco-Alexandrine tradition, more or less filtered through Cyrene, which held a significant role throughout the early Imperial age, tends to weaken and, at the latest by the end of the Flavian period, to disappear altogether. Local workshops, by now well trained, and in some cases identifiable through a distinctive formal language, become strongly influenced by Rome, either directly or through Carthage, capital of the province of Africa Proconsularis. Alongside this component is the growing influence of Asia Minor, fed by the increasing importation of marble from the eastern part of the empire, which would also have a great deal of influence on architectural decoration. The presence of a masterpiece in the Asiatic style, the female portrait-statue from the Serapeum, is the most striking testimonial of this evolutionary trend.
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- Copyright © The Society for Libyan Studies 2014
Footnotes
Una prima versione di questo lavoro è stata oggetto del mio intervento al XIIth International Colloquium of Roman Provincial Art, tenutosi a Pola, Croazia, dal 23 al 28 maggio 2011. Il tema prende avvio dallo studio per la pubblicazione del catalogo delle sculture del Museo e dei magazzini di Leptis Magna, coordinato da Luisa Musso, frutto della collaborazione tra il Department of Archaeology of Libya e l'Università degli Studi Roma Tre. Si dà in questa sede una presentazione preliminare di un importante nucleo di ritratti di provenienza leptitana, conservati nei musei di Leptis e di Tripoli. Mi è gradito ricordare la grande disponibilità di Mehmed Massaud e di Giabar Matug, già controllori del Dipartimento di Antichità di Leptis Magna, e del suo attuale responsabile, Mohamed Omar Faraj; della direttrice del Museo di Leptis, Halima Sharif, e della direttrice del National Museum di Tripoli, Fathia Alhawassi; sono grata inoltre a Ramadan Shebani e Mustafa Turjman, Department of Archaeology of Libya, Tripoli. Devo la ricerca che presento alla generosità, alla guida e alla collaborazione di Luisa Musso, direttore della Missione Archeologica dell'Università Roma Tre a Leptis Magna. Per un'attenta lettura del testo ringrazio Elena Ghisellini. Dove non diversamente indicato, le fotografie sono di Fabian Baroni – Missione Archeologica dell'Università Roma Tre a Leptis Magna.
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