Comentario por Alicia M. Canto el diciembre 2, 2009 a las 7:40am

Está abierta en Arlès, de octubre de 2009 a septiembre de 2010, una exposición sobre estos recientes hallazgos en el Ródano.

Presentación y programa en el Museo Departamental de Arlès:

Portal específico sobre la exposición: http://www.cesar-rhone.fr/

Especial atención a http://www.cesar-rhone.fr/index2.htm

Conferencias paralelas. Especialmente interesante me parece la del 15/12:

Mardi 15 décembre à 13h30 au CICRP
"La détermination de l’origine des sculptures majeures en marbre blanc sorties du Rhône"
Philippe Bromblet, ingénieur et géologue au CICRP
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Sin embargo, sobre la pieza estrella a la que aludía la noticia de 2008, hay discrepancias entre los expertos sobre que el busto sea realmente de César. Noticia y fotos en el New York Times:

A Museum Hails Caesar, Even if Some Antiquarians Don’t Agree

By MAÏA DE LA BAUME
Published: November 29, 2009

ARLES, France — Dredged up from the murky depths of the Rhône River, beneath a heap of wrecked cars, rotting tires and more than 20 centuries of silt, the statue’s white marble visage was plain as day

“My God, it’s Caesar!” Luc Long remembers shouting after his team of archaeologists and divers discovered the statue in 2007.

The Roman appears with little hair, a wrinkled forehead, a prominent Adam’s apple and features that, for Mr. Long, “seem carved in human flesh.” But Mr. Long did not realize at the time that he had discovered what he said was “the first portrait made of Caesar when he was alive.” The bust, which France’s Culture Ministry now dates from 46 B.C., is thought to be the only known surviving statue of Julius Caesar carved during his lifetime.

Historians say images of a contemporaneous Caesar are rare — they are generally idealized versions, produced after his assassination two years later, in 44 B.C. — so the sudden news of the bust’s emergence led some of them to question its authenticity.

Christian Goudineau, a French historian who lectures on Julius Caesar at the prestigious Collège de France in Paris, was caught off guard when Mr. Long told him of the discovery. “I was bewildered,” he recalled.

Some colleagues, he said, have suggested that the Caesar found in the Rhône does not resemble the Caesar usually shown, and that the statue might more likely portray a noble from Arles, a city founded by the Romans. One skeptic, Mary Beard, a classics professor at Cambridge, pointed out in her blog for Times Online, affiliated with The Times of London: “This style of portraiture lasted for centuries at Rome. There is nothing at all to suggest that it came from 49-46 B.C.”

(Foto) Gerard Julien/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
A Roman bust, center, on display at a museum at Arles, France. It is thought to be the only surviving statue of Julius Caesar that was carved during his lifetime.

After more than two years of restoration and identification, the bust now sits on a white platform in a museum, part of a collection of some 700 items found in the Rhône over the last 20 years that was inaugurated last month at the Musée Départmental de l’Arles Antique. Le Monde described the exhibit, called “Caesar: The Rhône as Memory,” as “one of the most clever and beautiful exhibits of the last 30 years.”

The display includes a rare third-century, six-foot-tall marble carving of the god Neptune; an undated bas-relief of Victoria, the Roman goddess of victory, covered with gold leaf; and a bronze of a captured barbarian with his hands tied behind his back, presumably awaiting his fate.

The bust is thought to have been carved to honor Caesar as a patron of Arles, a city he used as a base for his campaign against his rival, Pompey, for leadership of the Roman Empire.

Mr. Goudineau said that he thought the bust showed the same face as that of the Caesar on Roman coins; he dismissed the arguments presented by those who questioned the bust’s depiction. “Which noble from Arles would order a bust of himself made in the best, the most expensive and rare marble, and ship it by boat?” he asked.

Mr. Long wrote a 20-page essay on the bust’s origins for the exhibition’s catalog. And he has brought international experts to Arles to study his discovery.

For Claude Sintes, the director of the Arles museum, Mr. Long’s findings could fundamentally shift historians’ understanding of the importance of Arles, “an intensively Romanized port where the Romans wanted to spread their power,” he said.

The sculpture of Nike, which has its original varnish and gold covering, decorated a government building, while the bronze sculpture of the barbarian is said to be part of an imperial statue.

“We might discover that Arles was much more extensive than we thought and more economically powerful than we could have imagined,” Mr. Sintes said, adding that it was too early to draw further conclusions.

Mr. Goudineau, the historian, said, “Arles was twice bigger than what we thought.”

Like many of his colleagues, he said he believed that the discoveries brought to light the Roman past of a neighborhood of Arles called Trinquetaille on the right bank of the Rhône.

“I was convinced that there was something on the other side of the river,” he added, citing Ausonius, a Latin poet from the fourth century A.D. who referred to Arles as “the double Arles.”

For an experienced archaeologist and scuba diver like Mr. Long, who grew up in Arles, the Rhône is an unexpected treasure-trove.

“I worked in Libya, Malta and Gabon,” he said in an interview. “But the exceptional discoveries — I made them just outside my window.”

The Rhône is “a gloomy world,” he said. “It offers no visibility, a strong current, a lot of pollution, a constant flow of boats and regular attacks from brown bullheads,” fish commonly called mud pouts. The filthy water has been known to cause a variety of infections and ailments, including ear inflammation.

But Mr. Long also believes that the Rhône has a secret power. “It preserves wood, limestone and marble better than any sea” he said. The river also has “none of the abrasiveness of sea sand, and the current always runs in the same direction.”

In 1986, he dived with a friend who took him down 30 feet, to a spot rich with artifacts. For 20 years, joined by a crew of 20 art history students and professional divers, he dived several times a day, recovering hundreds of Roman vases and amphorae. He thought there would be no other treasures to explore.

But in fall 2007 came the “miracle finding,” he said, the discovery of the bust and the Neptune.

Mr. Sintes, the museum director, is convinced that the Rhône will continue to offer up marvels. “If the next discovery is Cleopatra,” he said, smiling, “we will have to extend the museum.”

Arles, on the Rhône River, was founded by the Romans.

Comentario por Guillermo Caso de los Cobos el diciembre 11, 2009 a las 1:51am

Bueno, por lo que se ve en esta reciente noticia que ha puesto amablemente la Dra. Canto, se comprueba que, después de un tiempo -desde su hallazgo- los especialistas franceses, Luc Long y Christian Goudineau, están convencidos que el supuesto busto de Julio César encontrado en el Ródano representa al genial general romano.

Es decir, que tal parece que no están dispuestos a aceptar, ni por asomo (¿el famoso chauvinismo francés estará aquí de nuevo jugando su papel?), ni la más mínima duda, a pesar de los argumentos críticos que se han venido mostrando al respecto. No sólo está la muy escéptica opinión de la profesora de filología clásica de Cambridge, Mary Beard, sino la de Paul Zanker, ex director del Instituto Alemán de Arqueología en Roma (y autor de la conocida obra "Augusto y el poder de las imágenes"), cuya adversa opinión recogía y traducía el Blog "La túnica de Neso", y la de que nos hicimos eco en el post "Rescatada una cabeza del dios Marte en el Ródano (Arles), además d...

Para P. Zanker, el punto de partida, para tener una impresión más certera del rostro de César, eran las monedas que se acuñaron con su efigie casi al final de su vida. No está de más reflejar también aquí algunas de ellas para hacernos una idea directa:

Foto

Foto

Foto

Foto


A continuación, P. Zanker subraya que dichas monedas han de compararse con el más que fiable busto de César que se halló en el foro de Tusculum y que se encuentra en el Museo
Arqueológico de Turín:

Foto: Julio César (Modelo Tusculum)

Foto: Julio César (Modelo Tusculum)

Como se puede apreciar, son muy semejantes el largo cuello con nuez pronunciada y arrugas marcadas (¿fruto quizás de cicatrices de algún tipo, tal como se ha sugerido?), nariz recta, pómulos sobresalientes, amplia y alta frente y marcada calvicie.

Unas características que encontramos en la supuesta máscara mortuoria que se encuentra, asimismo, en Turín, y, por tanto, cabe conceptuarlas bajo una perspectiva realista en su realización.

Foto: Máscara mortuoria de Julio César.

Ninguna de estas imágenes recuerda para nada al busto hallado en el Ródano. Incluso tampoco con el busto que se encuentra en el Museo Arqueológico "Antonio Salinas" de Palermo, del cual se dice que probablemente fue realizado a partir de la máscara mortuoria.

Foto: Julio César (Museo Arqueológico de Palermo).

Lo curioso, aún con todo, es que el arqueólogo Luc Long mantiene que el busto que halló es el de César, dando como..., no idealizado, como sucede con otros bustos de César posteriores.

Estaríamos, pues, ante dos visiones de la imagen de César conceptuadas como realistas, pero con el inconveniente para Luc Long de que no puede apoyarse -salvo con un excesivo voluntarismo- en los primeros ejemplos de imágenes que hemos expuesto.

Sólo se me ocurre en su favor argumentar que otro ejemplo (muy poco conocido, por lo demás) de la imagen de César, que presenta también determinados caracteres realistas, es la cabeza que se encuentra en el Museo Centrale Montemartini, Roma (hallada en el Esquilino), y que se la supone tallada entre el 50 y el 44 a. d. C., es decir, antes de su muerte, y de la que tampoco puede decirse que se asemeje demasiado al modelo fiable de Tusculum. La falta del cuello, además, impide tener un elemento importante de comparación.

Foto: Julio César (Museo Centrale Montemartini. Roma)

En fin, ni que decir tiene que esta será una cuestión siempre debatida, máxime cuando median, como en este caso, lógicos intereses para poner en valor el descubrimiento de un supuesto busto de César hallado en el país de los galos.

Comentario por José Luis Santos Fernández el marzo 30, 2011 a las 12:39pm

Découverte archéologique exceptionnelle à Nîmes - Nîmes - Des fouilles effectuées dans le Rhône ont permis d'exhumer des œuvres romaines somptueuses.

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Vendredi 23 Octobre 2009 - Exposition "César, le Rhône pour mémoire, 20 ans de fouilles dans le fleuve à Arles" au Musée Départemental Arles Antique. Commentaire en avant première de l'exposition par Luc LONG, l'archéologue ayant découvert le buste de Jules César dans le fleuve Rhône à Arles. L'exposition présente plus de 650 objets, des plus modestes aux plus exceptionnels. 

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