Said to be or not said to be: The findspot of the so-called Trebonianus Gallus statue at the Metropolitan Museum in New York

marlowe, elizabeth;

This article examines the primary accounts of the findspot of an 8-foot-tall bronze statue, usually identified as the Emperor Trebonianus Gallus, now residing at the Metropolitan Museum in New York. It identifies a previously-unrecognized source as the origin of the story of the statue’s alleged discovery two centuries ago
in the Lateran area of Rome, and argues that the source is not a trustworthy one. It considers the vested interests of the statue’s various owners, as well as the scholarly conventions, that kept – and continue to keep – the dubious story alive. It concludes that this is a cautionary tale; and that the provenances of the ostensibly best-known works of ancient art are just as much in need of critical examination as those of recently-surfaced antiquities.