Statue of Hermes
Marble Roman, Imperial period, first or second century A.D.
Copy of a Greek statue of the late fifth century B.C. probably by a follower of Polykleitos

The original statue may have represented Hermes, since other Roman copies have attributes of the messenger god, such as winged sandals. This statue and the Amazon to the right were once part of the well-known collection of antiquities formed by the first marquis of Lansdowne in the last quarter of the eighteenth century, when fashionable European noblemen purchased ancient sculpture in Rome. The statue once stood in a niche in the dining room at Lansdowne House on Berkeley Square in London. When the house was demolished, the beautifully designed paneling of the dining room was purchased by the Metropolitan Museum and reassembled in the English period rooms.

Ex colls. the first marquis of Landsdowne and descendants; William R. Hearst Gift of the Hearst Foundation, 1956 56.234.15

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City