Limestone relief with the figure of a woman

Limestone relief with the figure of a woman

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The figure has been identified as Niobe, who in Greek mythology suffered the loss of all her children when she incurred the displeasure of Leto, mother of Apollo and Artemis. Niobe thus became a stock figure of bereavement and would have been highly appropriate on a relief from a funerary monument such as this.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Limestone relief with the figure of a womanLimestone relief with the figure of a womanLimestone relief with the figure of a womanLimestone relief with the figure of a womanLimestone relief with the figure of a woman

The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.