Boxer of Quirinal

The bronze Boxer of Quirinal, also known as the Terme Boxer, is a Hellenistic Greek sculpture from the first century B.C of a sitting boxer with cestus. It is one of the two unrelated bronzes [The other is the unidentified "Hellenistic Ruler".] discovered on the slopes of the Quirinal within a month of each other in 1885, possibly from the remains of the Baths of Constantine. It appears that both had been carefully buried in antiquity. The realism of the portraiture suggests that it is a particular boxer, with a boxer's scars and broken nose, and not a representation of Polydeuces, one of the Dioscuri.

In preparation for the exhibition of both Quirinal bronzes at the Akademisches Kunstmuseum, Bonn, in the summer of 1989, celebrating the second millennium of the city's founding, both bronzes were meticulously conserved and published by Nikolaus Himmelmann. The sculpture is soldered together from eight separately cast segments. The lips, and wounds and scars about the face were originally inlaid with copper, and further copper inlays on the right shoulder, forearm, "cestus" and thigh represented drops of blood. The fingers were worn from being rubbed by passers-by in ancient times

Notes

References

*Nikolaus Himmelmann, 1998. "Herrscher und Athlet : Die Bronzen vom Quirinal" (Milan: Olivetti). Exhibition catalogue, Bonn.