Replica of the Great Cameo of Augustus, also known as the Ge - Lot 477

Replica of the Great Cameo of Augustus, also known as the Gem of Augustus Resin and gilded metal 19.5 x 22.5 cm The cameo commonly known as Gemma augustea is one of the masterpieces of glyptic art from the 1st century AD. It was cut from a double-layered onyx stone, white and very dark blue, around the year 10 AD, by an artist who may have been Dioscurides or one of his disciples. It is currently in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. In the lower left half of the cameo, Roman soldiers erect a trophy to celebrate their victory over the Barbarians seated at their feet. The prisoner's long hair suggests that he is a Celt or a German, or at any rate a man from the north. In the upper part of the cameo, immediately above this scene, a man with a laurel-crowned head dismounts from a two-horse chariot (a bige) driven by a goddess who may be Victory. He thus appears as a triumphant warrior, but probably not as a general officially receiving the triumph in Rome on his return from campaign (in which case, he would be mounted on a quadriga). He may be Tiberius, but he may not have put a definitive end to the military campaign he was waging in the northern lands. The upper central part of the cameo is obviously the most interesting: seated in profile, the deified Augustus is depicted in the guise of Jupiter, with an eagle at his feet. Behind him, the allegory of the Oikoumene (the whole inhabited earth) crowns him with the oak-leafed corona civica to thank him for having saved the lives of numerous Roman citizens. He is seated next to the goddess Rome, whom he saved from civil war. The staff of augury (lituus) in his left hand may suggest that he announced Tiberius' victories (but that Tiberius, having won under his auspices, continues to cede the first rank to him), while the Capricorn above his head recalls the auspicious day of his conception, December 23, and thus his predestination. The combination of these mythological and religious details gives him, even before his death, the allure of a new divinity.