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Museum of Classical Archaeology Databases

Omphalos Apollo

Roman copy of a Greek bronze prototype.

Near the findspot was a base featuring an omphalos (navel in ancient Greek), the mythical centre of the world. This is how the Apollo got its name, although now it is believed that the sculpture and the base do not belong together

Number: 
109
Material: 
Pentelic marble
Location of Original: 

Athens National Museum 45

Size: 
1.76m
Accession: 

Purchased in 1884 from Martinelli of Athens

References: 

Lippold: Griechische Plastik, 102 (n.1)
Richter: Sculpture & Sculptors of the Greeks (1950), figs.36-7
Pfeiff: Apollon (1943), pls. 27-8
Papaspiridi: Guide du Musée Nationale d’Athènes (1927), 34, no.45
Reporter: 19 June 1885, 891, no.101
Walston: Catalogue of Casts in the Museum of Classical Archaeology (1889), 28, no.109

Date: 
Roman. Original: c.460 BCE
Provenance: 

Found in 1862 in the Theatre of Dionysos, Athens

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Museum of Classical Archaeology, Cambridge

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