Category:Ampelokepoi hoard Eros (NAMA 16771)

English: The statuette depicts Eros naked as a chubby infant. The figure rests on the right leg, while the loose left one projects slightly. The sigmoid bent torso is frontal rendered while the head turns sharply to the left. His arms, bent at the elbows, extend in front of the chest. He holds a plectrum or musical clef in the right hand, while the slightly bent fingers of his left hand would hold an object, possibly a kithara or lyre, towards which he directs his gaze. The large head bears a double ivy wreath with fruits hanging like bunches. Short, spiral and curved locks of hair frame the round face, where dominate the huge almond-shaped eyes, with inset pupils, and the half-open fleshy lips. The fleshy cheeks emphasize the child-looking of the figure, as does the rendering of the naked body, especially the chubby short legs and the swollen belly. A small part of the left wing remains on the back, while the right wing, attached in antiquity to the scapula with tin, is lost. Eros stands on a rectangular parallelepiped base decorated above and below with relief bands. In its front right corner, is preserved part of a support in the form of a lion’s foot with an angular upper end, decorated on the outside with relief half-anthemia. The head, the torso and the limbs at their greater part were casted separately, while the joints of the parts are strikingly visible. Between its wings, there is a hollow socket, from which a stem would emerge, possibly for receiving a lamp, allowing the interpretation of the statuette as a candelabrum (lamp stand), perhaps in reuse. It belongs to the so-called “Ambelokipoi Hoard”, i.e. the set of 17 bronze statuettes of various sizes and types, which were discovered in 1964 during excavation works carried out by the Athens Water Company in the Athenian neighborhood of Ambelokipoi, near the modern Panathinaikos football stadium. They are miniature copies or reworkings of well-known Classical and, chiefly, Hellenistic statues, considered as works of Attic workshops that were active from the 1st century. BC until the 1st and 2nd c. AD (from the museum's website).