The Dying Gaul

— Jason
Listen here: https://historywiththeszilagyis.org/hwts156

The creation and display of sculpture and statuary is a hallmark of humanity since before written history.  Rocks carved into the shape of animals have been found in caves that were inhabited by humans during the Ice Age, one of the most famous being the Tuc d'Audoubert Cave Bison Sculpture.

Art techniques changed along with society as the domestication of plants and animals changed human activities, beginning in Mesopotamia..  The depiction of animals was used as an avenue to venerate nature spirits or gods in many early cities.  Anthropomorphic combinations of humans and animals represented many of the Mesopotamian gods and goddesses.  

Small statues representing household spirits could be kept in family shrines at home, while larger statues could be placed in areas of public commerce or worship.  The depictions of various gods and goddesses, mythical animals, and eventually rulers, began to populate the numerous city-states along the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. 

Many different materials were used to create these figures depending on the resources that were available.  The most common materials were bone, clay, stone, and wood that could be collected from the surrounding lands.  As long-distance trade networks developed however, more exotic, and semi-precious materials were used: lapis lazuli, carnelian, amethyst, jade, and granite being just a few examples.  Trade caravans crisscrossed the ancient world bringing goods to and from the Mediterranean Sea all the way to and from  India and China.

Ancient Egypt is renowned for its monumental temples, tombs, and statuary which were constructed along the length of the Nile River.  Thousands of depictions of gods and goddesses, pharaohs, and mythical beasts are testament to the ingenuity and enterprise of the ancient Egyptians.  The number of statues representing humans, animals, and boats found in the graves of  both commoners and royal tombs demonstrates the important nature of having such items in the afterlife. Statues of the deceased, anywhere from a miniature to life size (and sometimes bigger)  were also plentiful to ensure that if the physical body was destroyed the spirit still had a place to inhabit.

The human form in ancient Egyptian statuary is much more stylized and rigid in its character than later Greek and Rome works.  For the Egyptians, the ideal image of a male form presented the subject sitting or standing and with an idealized style that rarely changed over the millennia.  Very little embellishment pertaining to the living person’s actual physical characteristics were added to the statues, rather they had impassive faces, their arms were held close and rigid to the body and had standardized clothing depending on their station in life.

 The realistic sculptured depiction of the human body was first mastered by the ancient Greeks.  Their earliest works followed the portioned and rigid formula they borrowed from ancient Egypt.  However, as Greek civilization flourished, materials and wealth from across the Mediterranean Basin, the Black Sea, North Africa, and the Near East became more readily available for artisans to use.  Where the earliest Greek statues depicted figures either sitting or standing in rigid poses, by the sixth and fifth centuries BCE heroes and gods were depicted in glorious fashion.

One of the most stunning, and most copied, examples of Greek statues is known as The Dying Gaul, or The Dying Galatian.  The Gauls were a major tribal confederation in ancient Europe whose territory stretched from modern day France and Belgium through parts of Greece and into modern Turkey.  They were an inventive people who moved frequently and fought bitter wars against their more settled Greek and Roman neighbors.  

The Dying Gaul is believed to have been originally commissioned by Attalus I of Pergamon sometime between 230 and 220 BCE.  A tribe of Galls, called the Galatians by the Greeks, had pushed into central Turkey, and occasionally served as mercenaries for the rulers of the Hellenistic States after Alexander the Great.  If tribute and military work were not forthcoming, it was not unusual for the Galatians to raid the territory of their former Greek employers.  This situation came to a bloody end when Attalus of Pergamon was finally able to break the power of the Galatians and secure his borders.

The statue of The Dying Gaul is a work of art that is both stunning in its realism and tragic in its depiction of human frailty.  Its subject is a nude Galatian warrior sitting on the ground surrounded by his war panoply.  The man’s characteristically Celtic hairstyle, thick mustache, and torque around his neck clearly indicate his identity.  A bleeding sword wound was created in the warrior’s right side to illustrate the fatal injury that has doomed this man.  

The look of pain is clearly expressed on the dying Gaul’s face, and it is not a mocking caricature of a barbarian, rather it is the look of abject horror of approaching death.  While the statue depicts the defeat of the Galatians, there is no apparent attempt at dehumanizing the dying warrior.  He is presented in a manner that is not derogatory: though naked, he is proportioned as any Greek male would be idealized.  It is almost as if the sculptor was attempting to say: “this man represents barbarians, but he is not so different from the Greeks.”

It is believed that the now-lost original statue was cast in bronze and shortly thereafter was replicated in marble copies.  The statue currently displayed in Rome is thought to have been re-discovered in the early 17th century during excavations for the building of the Villa Ludovisi.  The villa was commissioned by Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi, nephew of Pope Gregory XV, and was located on the site of the ancient Gardens of Sallust on the Pincian Hill in Rome.  

The Dying Gaul statue from the Villa Ludovisi grounds is prized as a masterpiece of the ancient world.  It was acquired in the 1730s by Pope Clement XII and became part of the Capitoline collections.  The statue then became a war prize when Napoleon Bonaparte took it as part of the terms of the Treaty of Tolentino; it was displayed with other Italian works of art in the Louvre Museum until it was returned to Rome in1816.  Most recently, from December 12, 2013, until March 16, 2014, the work was on display in the main rotunda of the west wing of the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. before being returned to Rome once again.