Corinthian column capital

Corinthian column capital with kalathos (h. with rim 41 cm) dressed with two crowns of acanthus leaves (h. of the first crown 14 cm; of the second crown 27 cm). The latter are well-spaced and divided in five lobes with three points each; they feature a large midrib flanked by curved grooves tapered towards the bottom and by deep incisions that open upwards into the lateral lobes. The voids take the shape of vertical, drop-like holes obtained through the use of the drill. In some parts the lobes’ points appear to be crisply outlined and well separated from each other, while in others they take up an indented shape, due to the strong abrasion. The tip of the leaves, all broken away, must have been gently bent outwards. Behind the central folia appears the stem of the abacus’ rosette that bears two open leaves, indented and worked with the drill, whose extremities fall down and inwards. Amidst the foliage of the second crown spring the voluminous and almost vertical cauliculi which have deeply ridged shaft and a rim with everted sepals separated by means of two Y-shaped incisions. The volutes are broken away, while the flat-stripped helices cling onto the kalathos’ surface and end in a protruding bulge with central drill-hole, a reminder of the spiral. The abacus’ rosette appears to be unfinished and only its shape is preserved. The exemplar can be dated to the middle of the II century AD, in consideration of the fact that all the elements proper to a Corinthian capital, such as the abacus’ rosette and its stem, are still present. To such chronology point also the stylistic handling of the foliage, plastic yet less naturalistic, with drop-shaped drill-holes and lobes crisply outlined, but most of all the cauliculi with vertical ridges and rim cut with Y-shaped incisions.