Man and woman seated side by side: from the grand triclinium. The ruler is shown in conventional heroic nudity, while his wife appears pensive, as brides were often represented in ancient art.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Wall painting from Room H of the Villa of P. Fannius Synistor at Boscoreale
Period:Late Republican
Date:ca. 50–40 BCE
Culture:Roman
Medium:Fresco
Dimensions:Overall: 69 x 76in. (175.3 x 193cm)
Classification:Miscellaneous-Paintings
Credit Line:Rogers Fund, 1903
Object Number:03.14.6
Lehmann, Phyllis Williams and Herbert Bloch. 1953. Roman Wall Paintings from Boscoreale in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Monographs on Archaeology and the Fine Arts, Vol. 5. no. 2, pp. 30, 140, 164, 166, 183–85, pls. 4-5, Cambridge, Mass.: Archaeological Institute of America.
Dohrn, Tobias. 1960. Die Tyche von Antiochia. p. 43, pl. 40,2, Berlin: Gebr. Mann.
Cook, Brian. 1964. "The Boscoreale Cubiculum: A New Installation." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 22(5): pp. 166, 182–83, fig. 27.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1970. Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries. New York: Dutton.
Hoving, Thomas. 1970. "Director's Choice." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 28(5): p. 205.
Robertson, Martin and Cambridge University Press. 1975. A History of Greek Art, Vols. 1 and 2. pp. 572–90, pl. 181b, Cambridge, England.
Joly, Elda. 1980. "Teorie vecchie e nuove sulla ceramica policroma." Philias Charin. Miscellanea di Studi Classici in onore di Eugenio Manni. p. 1245, n.11, Rome: Giorgio Bretschneider Editore.
Müller, Frank G.J.M. 1994. The Wall paintings from the Oecus of the Villa of Publius Fannius Synistor in Boscoreale. pp. 53–71, pl. B, Amsterdam: J.C. Gieben.
Fuchs, Michaela. 1998. "Aurea Aetas: Ein Glückverheissendes Sibyllinum im grossen Oecus der Villa von Boscoreale." Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, 113: pp. 94–95, figs. 1–3.
Bartman, Elizabeth and Cambridge University Press. 1999. Portraits of Livia: Imaging the Imperial Woman in Augustan Rome. Cambridge.
Pfrommer, Michael. 1999. Alexandria, im Schatten der Pyramiden. p. 90, fig. 124, Mainz am Rhein: Philipp von Zabern.
Walker, Susan. 2000. "Portraits from Antinoopolis and Other Sites." Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt, Susan Walker, ed. p. 17, fig. 4, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
De Grummond, Nancy Thomson. 2002. "Mirrors, Marriage, and Mysteries." Journal of Roman Archaeology. Supplementary Series., 47: pp. 82–83, fig. 30.
Torelli, Mario. 2003. "The Frescoes of the Great Hall of the Villa at Boscoreale. Iconography and Politics." Myth, History and Culture in Republican Rome: Studies in Honour of T.P. Wiseman, David Braund and Christopher Gill, eds. p. 232, fig. 10.15, Exeter: University of Exeter Press.
Strocka, Volker Michael. 2005. "“Troja – Karthago – Rom: Ein vorvergilisches Bildprogramm in Terzigno bei Pompeji”." Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts, Römische Abteilung, 112: p. 82.
Picón, Carlos A. 2007. Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome no. 379, pp. 328, 481, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Pappalardo, Umberto. 2008. The Splendor of Roman Wall Painting. p. 39, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum.
Bergmann, Bettina. 2010. "New Perspectives on the Villa of Publius Fannius Synistor at Boscoreale." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 67(4): pp. 13, 24–25, fig. 41.
Harvey, Sarah M. 2010. "Iron Tools from a Roman Villa at Boscoreale, Italy, in the Field Museum and the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology." American Journal of Archaeology, 114(4): pp. 697–714.
Moreno, Paolo, Mario Grimaldi, and Elisa Chiara Portale. 2011. "Pittura in Grecia dalla maniera alla restaurazione romana (323-31 a.C.): rapporti con l'Occidente." Pittura ellenistica in Italia e in Sicilia, Linguaggi e Tradizioni: Atti del Convegno di Studi (Messina, 24-25 settembre 2009), Gioacchine Francesco La Torre and Mario Torelli, eds. pp. 12–13, 20, fig. 8b, Rome: Giorgio Bretschneider Editore.
Barbet, Alix and Annie Verbanck-Piérard. 2013. La Villa Romaine de Boscoreale et Ses Fresques, Vol. I and II. pl. X, 2, Arles: Errance.
Picón, Carlos A. and Seán Hemingway. 2016. Pergamon and the Hellenistic Kingdoms of the Ancient World p. 97, fig. 128, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Galitz, Kathryn. 2016. The Metropolitan Museum of Art: Masterpiece Paintings. no. 26, p. 33, New York: Skira.
Hemingway, Seán. 2016. "An Early Imperial Bronze Sphinx Support in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York." Proceedings of the XVIIth International Congress on Ancient Bronzes, Izmir, Alessandra Giumlia-Mair and Carol Mattusch, eds. p. 180, fig. 13, Autun, France: Editions Mergoil.
Plantzos, Dimitris. 2018. The Art of Painting in Ancient Greece. pp. 296–99, fig. 292, Atlanta: Lockwood Press.
Zanker, Paul. 2019. "The Frescoes from the Villa of Publius Fannius Synistor at Boscoreale in The Metropolitan Museum of Art." Art of the Hellenistic Kingdoms from Pergamon to Rome, Seán Hemingway and Kyriaki Karoglou, eds. pp. 196–98, figs. 9–10, 12, New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Zanker, Paul, Seán Hemingway, Christopher S. Lightfoot, and Joan R. Mertens. 2019. Roman Art : A Guide through the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Collection. no. 28, pp. 23, 90–95, 103, figs. 58, 60, New York: Scala Publishers.
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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than 30,000 works ranging in date from the Neolithic period to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312.
