Bacchanalian Relief
Unknown Artist
200s CE
Medium
schist
Dimensions
24.5 × 61 × 14 cm
Classification
Stone
Department
Indian and Southeast Asian Art
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift of Maxeen and John Flower in honor of Dr. Stanislaw Czuma
Accession Number
2011.140
About this artwork
Grape vines create vignettes with scenes of drunken revelry on this architectural carving that once fit by joinery to other carved stone blocks at the base of a Buddhist monument. Bacchus himself, the Greco-Roman god of wine, may be the third figure from the left; bearded, portly, and inebriated, his garment slips as he collapses. Cupid and Aphrodite appear in the vignette on the right next to an amorous couple. On the side is a female nature divinity, grasping the branch of a tree, but unlike h...