[Artifacts] The fallen warrior…

Currently part of the Greco-Roman exhibit over at the Art Institute of Chicago, we find a Roman Era marble dating to the 2nd Century CE. It depicts a fallen warrior, struck by a mortal wound to the back. It is an appropriation of scene depicting a much larger battle between the Greeks and the Amazons; the original of which was found on the exterior of the shield situated with the monumental cult statue of the goddess Athena Parthenos which stood inside the Parthenon on the Acropolis in Athens. Its original sculptor, Phidias created it in the 5th Century BCE.

This relief would have originally been adapted and decorated a wall, possibly in colonnade or a courtyard.