Art Institute of Chicago

Portrait Bust of Antinous as Osiris

Roman

Date

130-138, with 21st–century English restorations

Medium

Marble

Department

Arts of Greece, Rome, and Byzantium

Institution

Art Institute of Chicago

Antinous (about 111–130), the young lover of Emperor Hadrian (reigned 117–38), drowned in the Nile River in the year 130 while they were on an imperial tour of Egypt. Devastated by the untimely death, Hadrian founded a city in his honor, Antinoupolis, located on the east bank of the Nile, and pronounced him a god. Worship of Antinous spread, and over time portraits of him were produced throughout the Roman Empire. In this depiction, Antinous wears the traditional headdress of an Egyptian pharaoh known as a nemes. This regalia identifies him with Osiris, the Egyptian god of the underworld, who drowned in the Nile and was reborn from its waters.

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