Lower Part of a Marble Statue of Hygieia in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, January 2012

Title: Lower part of a marble seated statue of Hygieia

Period: Imperial

Date: 1st or 2nd century CE

Culture: Roman

Medium: Marble

Dimensions: H. 50 in. (127.0 cm)
Width 30 in. (76.2 cm.)
Depth 40 (101.6 cm)(w/ base)

Classification: Stone Sculpture

Credit Line: Gift of Mrs. Frederick F. Thompson, 1903

Accession Number: 03.12.11a


Copy or adaptation of a Greek work of the 3rd or 2nd century B.C.

Hygieia, the personification of Health, was the daughter of Asklepios, the god of healing. Snakes were closely associated with both figures and were actually kept in many of the sanctuaries where the sick gathered. This Hygieia was shown feeding a gigantic serpent. The statue was once part of the collection formed in Rome in the early seventeenth century by the Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani.

Text from: www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/246996