Media Information

 
 
 
Collection:
ADJUNCT MODULE A: ITALIAN ART
Preferred Title:
Floor Mosaic of Street Musicians
Alternate Title:
Suonatori ambulanti
Image View:
Overall view (with black background)
Creator:
Dioskourides of Samos (Ancient Greek mosaicist, ca. 2nd century BCE)
Location:
repository: Museo Archeologico Nazionale (Naples, Campania, Italy) 9985
Location Note:
Piazza Museo Nazionale, 19; room LIX, no. 3
GPS:
40.8534 14.2505
Date:
ca. 150-125 BCE (creation)
Cultural Context:
Roman (ancient)
Style Period:
Greco-Roman; Hellenistic
Work Type 1:
mosaic (visual work)
Work Type 2:
floor (surface element)
Classification:
mosaics
Material:
colored stone tesserae
Technique:
mosaic (process)
Measurements:
48 cm (height) x 46 cm (width)
Inscription:
Dioskourides Samios epoiese (Dioskourides of Samos made me)
Description:
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/mus eoarcheologiconazion ale)
Collection:
Adjunct Module A: Italian Art
Identifier:
7A3-R-NAM-TSM-A09
Rights:
© Scott Gilchrist, Archivision, Inc.

Floor Mosaic of Street Musicians