Statue of Hercules Farnese

Large statue hand-carved in Vicenza stone, reproduced by Peotta Bruno & Geom. Luigi Srl.

Dimensions: height cm. 210


The Statue of Hercules Farnese is a renowned classical sculpture depicting Hercules, the mythological hero, resting after completing his famous Twelve Labours. He is depicted leaning on a club draped with the skin of the Nemean lion, which he defeated during one of his labours. The statue's muscular and powerful physique highlights classical ideals of strength and heroism.
The Farnese Hercules is probably an enlarged copy of the statue made in the early third century AD and signed by Glykon, who is otherwise unknown; the name is Greek but he may have worked in Rome.
Like much ancient Roman sculpture it is a copy or version of a much older Greek original that was well known, in this case an original by Lysippos (or his circle) that would have been made in the 4th century BC. The enlarged copy was made for the Baths of Caracalla in Rome and is now in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples.
The Hercules is one of the most famous sculptures of antiquity and has fixed the image of the mythical hero in the European imagination.

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