Wounded Gaul
Unknown (Roman copy after a Pergamene original) · 2nd century AD
A young warrior has sunk to one knee on his oval shield, his sword beside him, blood running from a wound. He is naked, in the Celtic manner that so struck the Greeks, and his hair falls in loose locks that the sculptor separated with a drill. The figure is less than a metre high, smaller than life. Restorations in Carrara marble include the right arm, the left arm, the right leg above the knee and both feet; the shield shaped plinth is a modern mount, and the head has been repolished.
Around two hundred BC a king of Pergamon named Attalos dedicated on the Acropolis of Athens a set of small statues celebrating victories over giants, Amazons, Persians and Gauls, the so called Small Attalid Dedication. Roman copies of its fallen and kneeling fighters survive in Naples, Venice and here. This one, in marble from Dokimeion in Asia Minor, was carved in Rome in the second century AD and was found there around 1514. It came to the Louvre in 1807 with the Borghese collection. Note that the defeated Gaul is shown with dignity, not contempt.
Did You Know? The sculptor carved the blood running from the wound, a rare touch of gore in Greek and Roman marble.
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