Narcissus
Unknown · c. 100 AD
A naked youth leans against a low pillar, his short hair close to the skull, his mouth slightly open, in a pose of quiet self absorption. The traditional name Narcissus, the boy who fell in love with his own reflection, is a modern label rather than an ancient one, but the pensive attitude suits it. Much has been mended: the head was in two pieces, the legs in several, the left forearm and right eye are marble replacements, the right arm is missing from the armpit, and the surface was repolished after the repairs.
The statue was carved in Carrara marble in Italy around one hundred AD, after a Greek model of the fourth century BC, in the tradition of leaning figures created in the circle of Praxiteles. It came to the Louvre in 1861 with the vast collection of the Marquis Campana, a Roman banker whose antiquities were bought by Napoleon the Third after his arrest for embezzlement. Look at the oval plinth and the pillar, which had to carry the weight the marble body could not.
Did You Know? Remains of the lost right hand are still attached to the small of the back, showing where the arm once rested.
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