Statuette of a Lictor
First half of the 1st century
- Medium
- Bronze
- Classification
- Sculpture
- Dimensions
- 11.7 × 5 × 3 cm (4 5/8 × 2 × 1 1/8 in.)
- Culture
- Roman Empire
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium
- Credit line
- James W. and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
The official attendants and bodyguards of Roman magistrates known as lictors were usually citizens of low birth, such as freedmen (former slaves). Typically, as seen here, a lictor wore a toga and carried in his left hand the bundle of elm or birch rods tied with a red belt that symbolized the magistrates’ executive power. This statuette likely belonged to a larger historical relief depicting a ceremonial scene, perhaps on the breastplate of a bronze statue of a horse, where similar statuettes of lictors are known to have been displayed.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
