X. Sarcophagi of Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus

i. 11-1/2”h., c 1850, Statuary (Greek?) marble (Unengraved: the largest model of the sarcophagus we’ve yet encountered) ii. 8”h., c 1850, Africano marble iii. 7-1/2”h., c 1850, Peperino (the stone identical to that used in the ancient sarcophagus) iv. 4-1/4”h., c 1840, Giallo antico marble, inkwell lacking lid v. 3”h., c 1850, Giallo antico marble

See Pricing Sometimes/more often than not/almost always, enduring forms rely as much on felicitous timing as momentous deeds. In 298 BCE, Lucius Cornelius Scipio Barbatus, a Roman Consul, led his army to a great victory over the Etruscans at the Battle of Volterra. Twenty-eight years later, he was dead, entombed in a particularly handsome sarcophagus, placed in the family vault along the Appian Way, and forgotten.

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Until, 2000 years later, it was rediscovered just in time to act on the imaginations of ever-increasing throngs of Roman tourists, may of whom returned home with models of Lucius’ sarcophagus. Why were these such a hit? They satisfy a range of curiosities- morbid and military, historical and hubristic, - over empire lost and rediscovered, the past and the future; setting us in a Rome-antic frame of mind. Roman Nights; Or, the Tomb of the Scipios, by Allessandro Verri, a not very important Italian author (perhaps his time awaits), a c. 1800 nocturnal fantasia, begins with a chapter subtitled “The spectres are led from the tomb of Scipio to the Palatine Hill”. Not long afterwards - ”they cried out with one accord. Alas! how idle the hope of immortal fame! In thy native land, by thee so ennobled, O Scipio! So gone is thy glory, that thy heedless descendants deliberately trample over the fragments of thy tomb”.

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