Detail View: ADJUNCT MODULE A: ITALIAN ART: Floor Mosaic of Street Musicians
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Collection:
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ADJUNCT MODULE A: ITALIAN ART
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Preferred Title:
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Floor Mosaic of Street Musicians
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Alternate Title:
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Suonatori ambulanti
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Image View:
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Detail, masked characters of the kolax (flatterer) playing cymbals and the parasitos (sponger) playing the tympanum
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Creator:
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Dioskourides of Samos (Ancient Greek mosaicist, ca. 2nd century BCE)
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Location:
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repository: Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Naples, Campania, Italy) 9985
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Location Note:
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Piazza Museo Nazionale, 19; room LIX, no. 3
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GPS:
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+40.8534+14.2505
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Date:
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ca. 150-125 BCE (creation)
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Cultural Context:
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Roman (ancient)
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Style Period:
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Greco-Roman; Hellenistic
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Work Type 1:
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mosaic (visual work)
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Work Type 2:
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floor (surface element)
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Classification:
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mosaics
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Material:
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colored stone tesserae
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Technique:
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mosaic (process)
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Measurements:
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48 cm (height) x 46 cm (width)
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Inscription:
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Dioskourides Samios epoiese (Dioskourides of Samos made me)
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Description:
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The central emblemata of a floor (Villa of Cicero, outside Herculaneum Gate, excavated 1763), depicts a group of four characters who are possibly the metragyrtai of the cult of Cybele. They play instruments outside a house whose entrance is seen in the right corner. They wear the masks of three characters from the Greek New Comedy: the tympanum player is the parasitos, with an aquiline nose and a furrowed brow; near him is the kolax, the flatterer, with prominent nose and relaxed florid face, who is playing the cymbals while immediately behind him is the diamitros etaira, the double flute player whose hair is gathered in a headscarf. The last figure is a child or a dwarf, without a mask, playing a sort of horn. The scene is probably taken from a comedy by Menander entitled "Theophorumene", The Possessed Woman, of which only a few verses survive. The scene is copied from an Alexandrine original of the third century BCE; this mosaic is signed by Dioskourides Samios. (Source: Naples National Archaeological Museum [website]; http://cir.campania.beniculturali.it/museoarcheologiconazionale)
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Collection:
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Adjunct Module A: Italian Art
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Identifier:
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7A3-R-NAM-TSM-A07
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Rights:
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© Scott Gilchrist, Archivision, Inc.
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