Vatican City Rome Augusto of Prima Porta 1980 stamp

Postcard

 

• Picture / Image:  Augusto of Prima Porta
• Publisher:  Monumenti Musei e Gallerie Pontificie
• Postally used:  yes
• Stamp:  150L 1979 50th Anniversary of the Vatican poss SG727
• Postmark(s):  Vatican picture cancel
• Sent to:  Rodick Street, Liverpool
• Notes & Key words: 

------------------------------------------------

Postage & Packing:

UK (incl. IOM, CI & BFPO): 99p

Europe: £1.60

Rest of world (inc. USA etc): £2.75

No additional charges for more than one postcard. You can buy as many postcards from me as you like and you will just pay the fee above once. (If buying postcards with other things such as books, please contact or wait for invoice before paying).

Payment Methods:

UK - PayPal, Cheque (from UK bank) or postal order

Outside UK: PayPal or Google Checkout ONLY please.   NO non-UK currency checks or money orders (sorry).

NOTE: All postcards are sent in brand new stiffened envelopes which I have bought for the task. These are specially made to protect postcards and you may be able to re-use them. In addition there are other costs to sending so the above charge is not just for the stamp!

----------------------------------------------

Text from the free encyclopedia WIKIPEDIA may appear below to give a little background information:

*************

Augustus of Prima Porta is a 2.04m high marble statue of Augustus Caesar which was discovered on April 20, 1863 in the Villa of Livia at Prima Porta, near Rome. His wife Livia Drusilla retired to the villa after his death. The sculpture is now displayed in the Braccio Nuovo of the Vatican Museums.

The dating of the Primaporta piece is widely contested. It is thought to be a marble copy of a possible bronze original. This original, along with other high honors, was devoted to Augustus by the Senate in 20 BC and set up in a public place. Up until this time Augustus had lived modestly, but the fact that the statue was found in his widow's villa shows that he was thoroughly pleased with it.

It is also contested that this particular sculpture is a reworking in marble of a bronze original, possibly a gift from Tiberius Caesar to his mother Livia (since it was found in her Villa Ad Galinas in the vicinity of the ninth marker of the via Flaminia, and close to a late Imperial gate called Prima Porta) after Augustus' death and in honor of the woman who had campaigned so long for him to become the next Caesar. This would explain the divine references to Augustus in the piece, his being barefoot (the standard representation of gods or heroes in classical iconography). Also the reliefs in the cuirass which depicts the retrieval of the standards captured by the Parthians, an event in which the young Tiberius himself took a part, serving as intermediary in the act with the Parthian kin, which is shown in the central scene of the armor, possibly his grandest service to his adopted father Augustus. With the introduction of Tiberius as the figure responsible for the retrieval of the standards, he associates himself with Augustus, the emperor and the new god, as Augustus himself had done previously with Julius Caesar. Under this hypothesis, the dating of the statue can be placed during the first years of Tiberius reign as emperor.