Emperor Nero (37-68 AD) as a boy
Roman, 1st century AD
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
51 AD - 54 AD - 1763
Materials
Carrara marble
Measurements
1365 x 680 x 395 mm
Place of origin
Italy
Order this imageCollection
Petworth House and Park, West Sussex
NT 486361
Caption
This statue has recently been re-identified as a boyhood portrait of the much despised Emperor Nero (AD37–68). Nero came to power as a teenager, and his reign was notorious for tyranny, madness and cruelty, including the murder of his mother Agrippina and wife Poppaea, and the deliberate burning of Rome. Consequently, he was highly unpopular in his own lifetime, and many statues of Nero were defaced or destroyed following his suicide in AD 68. This statue of him as a boy and heir is a remarkable survival and thought to be one of only three examples in existence depicting Nero in childhood. It was probably created to champion his claim to the throne, as he was adopted by the Emperor Claudius (10BC–AD54), who had a natural son and heir, Britannicus. The sculpture was acquired by Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont (1710–63), in Italy in 1763 to add to his remarkable collection of antiquities.
Summary
Carrara marble, Emperor Nero (37-68 AD) as a boy, Roman, c. AD 51-4, with modern restorations. A marble figure of the Emperor Nero as a boy, wearing a toga draped over a sleeved tunic, with the proper left hand raised, the index finger pointing. The figure holds a scroll in the proper right hand. Behind the proper right leg is a scrinium or box containing holding papers. A fragment of the head dates from of the Julio-Claudian period (27 BC - 68 AD). Modern restorations are to the tip of the nose, part of the left side of the head (including the eye and ear), the neck, the right hand and wrist, the left forearm, and the big toes; the drapery is also patched.
Full description
This figure is one of the earliest known portraits of the Roman emperor Nero. Captured at about fourteen, as he moved from immaturity to manhood, it was most likely produced on Nero’s adoption as heir to the Roman Empire by his great-uncle and stepfather Claudius. It would have been circulated around the provinces as an official portrait to show the people what their future emperor looked like. The boy depicted here is in early adolescence, his physiognomy still relatively undefined and childlike. He stands in the chiastic pose, weight borne on the right leg, the left leg bent at the knee and drawn back. Togate, he is shown in the manner of a public official, holding in the right hand a scroll and gesturing with the left hand for oratorical effect. These are modern restorations, possibly carried out by the Italian sculptor-restorer Bartolomeo Cavaceppi (1716-99), who is known to have worked on antiquities collected by Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont. Records show that the figure was acquired by Egremont via the architect and dealer Matthew Brettingham in ‘Italy 1763’. Early portraits of Nero are rare; two of the best-known examples are preserved in the Museo Nazionale di Antichità, Parma, and in the Louvre, Paris. These, like Petworth’s, were probably created in acknowledgement of the young prince becoming heir apparent (as opposed to Claudius’ biological son, Britannicus). They are set in similar postures: a placid youth wearing a richly draped toga, with arms slightly outstretched. The Petworth portrait possesses all the characteristics of the first portrait type of the young Nero, especially evident in the hairstyle, nature and form of the mouth, and eyes. Nero acceded to the imperial throne in AD 54, his fourteen-year reign notoriously tyrannical and debauched. After his suicide in AD 68 aged thirty, Nero was subjected to a de facto damnatio memoriae (a ‘condemnation of memory’) in which his name and image, as it appeared in statuary, coinage and inscriptions, were mutilated or destroyed. This may well account for the condition of the Petworth figure, which was decapitated and fragmented before being reformed in the eighteenth century. The figure was identified as the young Nero in 2011 by Dr Miles Russell, Senior Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Bournemouth.
Provenance
Probably acquired in 1763 by Charles Wyndham, 2nd Earl of Egremont through Matthew Brettingham the younger (the circumstances of the discovery are unknown, records reading simply ‘Italy 1763’); then by descent until Charles Wyndham, 3rd Lord Leconfield gave Petworth House to the National Trust in 1947 and his heir John Wyndham, 1st Lord Egremont arranged in 1956 for a major part of the collection’s acceptance in lieu of death duties by H. M. Treasury; formally transferred to the National Trust in 1982.
Marks and inscriptions
Front of base: 55
Makers and roles
Roman, 1st century AD , sculptor
References
Wyndham 1915 Margaret Wyndham, Catalogue of the Collection of Greek and Roman Antiquities in the Possession of Lord Leconfield, The Medici Society, 1915, pp. 88-89. Hiesinger 1975: Ulrich W. Hiesinger, 'The Portraits of Nero', American Journal of Archaeology, vol. 79, no. 2, 1975, pp. 113–124. Raeder 2000: Joachim Raeder, Die antiken Skulpturen in Petworth House (West Sussex), Monumenta Artis Romanae 28, Mainz, 2000 Beard and Henderson 2001: Mary Beard and John Henderson, Classical art from Greece to Rome, Oxford 2001, pp. 218-25. Russell and Manley 2016: Miles Russell and Harry Manley, 'Sanctioning Memory: Changing Identity. Using 3D laser scanning to identify two 'new' portraits of the Emperor Nero in English antiquarian collections', Internet Archaeology 42, 2016