The Belvedere Torso

The Belvedere Torso

A mind elevated to the contemplation of excellence perceives in this defaced and shattered fragment... the traces of superlative genius, the reliques of a work on which succeeding ages can only gaze with inadequate admiration. - Sir Joshua Reynolds

This fragmentary work may be more celebrated for how it has influenced other artists than for anything else.

Michelangelo, for one, adopted the pose in his great Last Judgment for the Sistine Chapel for his St. Bartholomew, who was martyred, like Marsyas from Greek myth, by having his skin flayed off. (Marsyas has been suggested as one of the potential models for the Belvedere torso, along with Hercules.)

As a young man, Peter Paul Rubens made an especially fine sketch of this work.