Analecta Romana Instituti Danici Xxxv/Xxxvi
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ANALECTA ROMANA INSTITUTI DANICI XXXV/XXXVI ANALECTA ROMANA INSTITUTI DANICI XXXV/XXXVI 2010/11 ROMAE MMX-MMXI ANALECTA ROMANA INSTITUTI DANICI XXXV-XXXVI © 2011 Accademia di Danimarca ISSN 2035-2506 Published with the support of a grant from: Det Frie Forskningsråd / Kultur og Kommunikation SCIENTIFIC BOARD Ove Hornby (Bestyrelsesformand, Det Danske Institut i Rom) Jesper Carlsen (Syddansk Universitet) Astrid Elbek (Det Jyske Musikkonservatorium) Karsten Friis-Jensen (Københavns Universitet) Helge Gamrath (Aalborg Universitet) Maria Fabricius Hansen (Ny Carlsbergfondet) Michael Herslund (Copenhagen Business School) Hannemarie Ragn Jensen (Københavns Universitet) Kurt Villads Jensen (Syddansk Universitet) Mogens Nykjær (Aarhus Universitet) Gunnar Ortmann (Det Danske Ambassade i Rom) Bodil Bundgaard Rasmussen (Nationalmuseet, København) Birger Riis-Jørgensen (Det Danske Ambassade i Rom) Lene Schøsler (Københavns Universitet) Poul Schülein (Arkitema, København) Anne Sejten (Roskilde Universitet) EDITORIAL BOARD Marianne Pade (Chair of Editorial Board, Det Danske Institut i Rom) Erik Bach (Det Danske Institut i Rom) Patrick Kragelund (Danmarks Kunstbibliotek) Gitte Lønstrup Dal Santo (Det Danske Institut i Rom) Gert Sørensen (Københavns Universitet) Birgit Tang (Det Danske Institut i Rom) Maria Adelaide Zocchi (Det Danske Institut i Rom) Analecta Romana Instituti Danici. — Vol. I (1960) — . Copenhagen: Munksgaard. From 1985: Rome, «L’ERMA» di Bretschneider. From 2007 (online): Accademia di Danimarca ANALECTA ROMANA INSTITUTI DANICI encourages scholarly contributions within the Academy’s research fields. All contributions will be peer reviewed. Manuscripts to be considered for publication should be sent to: [email protected]. Authors are requested to consult the journal’s guidelines at www.acdan.it. Contents STINE BIRK Third-Century Sarcophagi from the City of Rome: A Chronological Reappraisal 7 URSULA LEHMANN-BROCKHAUS Asger Jorn: Il grande rilievo nell’Aarhus Statgymnasium 31 METTE MIDTGÅRD MADSEN: Sonne’s Frieze versus Salto’s Reconstruction. Ethical and Practical Reflections on a New Reconstruction of the Frieze on Thorvaldsens Museum 61 ERIK HANSEN, JØRGEN NIELSEN, JESPER ASSERBO e TONNY JESPERSEN: Due cupole a Villa Adriana. Calcoli statici 83 JØRGEN NIELSEN A/S, TONNY JESPERSEN, JESPER ASSERBO: Investigazioni statiche sull’edificio romano della “Piazza d’Oro” a Villa Adriana 101 PETER DYRBY: Genre and Intertextuality as a Dialogical Narrative Strategy for the Migrant Writer 119 Third-Century Sarcophagi from the City of Rome: A Chronological Reappraisal by STINE BIRK Abstract. The third century shows a great lack of securely dated monuments that we can rely on when working with sculpture. This lack leaves the dating of sarcophagi, and other sculptures, on very shaky ground. While scholars of sarcophagi have achieved significant progress, there are still problems concerning the chronology and stylistic development which affect the interpretation of sarcophagi in their social context. This article offers a reappraisal of the chronology of relief-adorned sarcophagi produced in Rome in the third century AD. It focuses on how the chronological development of these important monuments of social history has been constructed, on their reception after antiquity, and on the significance of these two issues for the way that sarcophagi are studied today. “Das dritte Jahrhundert ist die dunkelste for establishing a chronology of third-century Epoche der antiken Kunstgeschichte.”1 sculpture.4 Theoretically, it should be possible Thus wrote Gerhard Rodenwaldt in 1935 to date sarcophagi with a portrait by dating and in many ways this is still true. When the portrait, since the date of a portrait can the production of large state-commissioned generally be verified through comparison with monuments and historical reliefs stopped imperial portraits in coinage and statuary.5 after the Severan period, a very valuable Therefore, by means of the portraits, the source of datable comparanda was lost to sarcophagi can be fixed chronologically, and us.2 This lack of comparative material poses from this point of departure the stylistic problems when we attempt to identify features of the third-century sculptural sculpture belonging to the third century. production can be studied.6 The method Simultaneously with the disappearance of is deceptively simple, yet several problems the state-commissioned monuments, the emerge when it is applied to the material in sculptural production in Rome seems to have question. dropped dramatically, and even though the The first problem is that portraits on production of imperial portraits continued, sarcophagi are small in scale, which sometimes the nature of the production changed and complicates dating. The small scale makes the quantity decreased. All this means that them difficult to compare with full-size the evidence for sculpture in general, whether portraits, because the techniques used when mythological or portrait statuary, remains carving a portrait on a sarcophagus are scarce.3 different than those used on larger scale Despite these developments, the third- sculpture.7 Furthermore, probably as a century sculptural production includes consequence of the small scale, portraits one important aspect worthy of note: the on sarcophagi are not as detailed as portrait production of a large number of relief- statuary, and the crude and sketchy character adorned sarcophagi. The production that of many sarcophagus portraits make them was undertaken in Rome for about two difficult to date.8 Another problem is the hundred years, combined with the presence state of preservation: there are numerous of portraits, makes it likely that these examples of sarcophagi whose weathered sarcophagi constitute the most reliable basis conditions have made the physiognomic 8 STINE B IRK analysis of the portrait impossible. But not for ascribing pieces of art, such as paintings, only the occasionally weathered surfaces to certain masters and schools. It builds upon or fragmentary state caused by years of a principle that says that stylistic features that exposure but also the many Baroque and look the same belong to the same period.13 later restorations make a stylistic analysis With Kaschnitz von Weinberg a structur- problematic. Furthermore, the great variation alist approach gained ground within classical in the quality of work sometimes distorts our archaeology.14 He described stylistic develop- picture of style, causing, for example, high ment as a pattern of ever-changing epochs of quality sarcophagi to be accumulated within what he called classicism and realism.15 To under- a relatively limited period of time. We will stand the society and its history he interpreted return to this later. each period on the basis of the monuments The fact that all portraits on sarcophagi ascribed to the period (in his case, Roman are of private persons and that no imperial portraits). He saw the transition from one portraits have been identified, complicates the period to another as a reaction caused by the use of sarcophagi as a means of establishing style of the previous period.16 This approach a chronology of sculpture.9 It raises the has been influential in stylistic discussions of question of fashion, and of the continuity Roman sculpture ever since.17 There are, how- and duration of stylistic trends, and reminds ever, some obvious problems and pitfalls im- us of the problem that we do not know plied in using a structural approach in stylistic how long certain styles or features, such as analysis. There is a great danger of forcing hairstyle, remained in fashion after the end of a non-flexible framework upon the material, an emperor’s reign.10 Furthermore, we should because one prerequisite of stylistic analysis is consider the possibility that old-fashioned that the evolution of the material concerned styles were deliberately chosen to allude, for is continuous and uniform. It has to be con- example, to ancestry, and that a person could tinuous because great leaps would remove the retain his/her hairstyle several years after it basis for comparative stylistic analysis, and went out of fashion. Generally, however, we uniform because stylistic analysis builds upon can assume that the use of a hairstyle or facial an assumption of style being evolutionary, features followed the emperor or empress that style moves from one stage to the next.18 who started the vogue.11 The last reservation During the last 200 years of research, the regarding the use of sarcophagus portraits as potential of sarcophagus portraits for dating a dating criterion concerns the question of both sarcophagi and other kinds of sculpture simultaneity. How can we know that portrait has played an important role. In the study of and relief were carved at the same time? This the sarcophagus reliefs, it has been an aim is important to consider since the style of a in itself to establish a stylistic development, relief sometimes contrasts the dating of the sometimes with the consequence that they are portrait carved on it.12 The following section considered to be pieces of art rather than as discusses the stylistic development and private commemorative monuments whose the advantages and disadvantages of using reliefs were designed and manipulated in portraits on sarcophagi as a parameter for order to accommodate a patron. establishing a chronology. Rodenwaldt is somewhat of a ‘founding father’ in Sarkophag-Studien.19 His article “Zur Style and Chronology of Third-Century Sarcophagi