Marble relief with a dancing maenad

The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Marble relief with a dancing maenad
Adaptation of work attributed to Kallimachos
Period: Early Imperial, Augustan
Date: ca. 27 B.C. - A.D. 14
Culture: Roman
Medium: Marble, Pentelic
Dimensions: H. 56 5/16 in. (143 cm)
Classification: Stone Sculpture
Credit Line: Fletcher Fund, 1935
Accession Number: 35.11.3
This artwork is currently on display in Gallery 153
http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/253483?rpp=60&pg=1&gallerynos=153&rndkey=20140201&ao=on&ft=*&pos=26
Scanned with 123DCatch on iPhone 5S on 26 Jan. 2014

Copy of a Greek relief of ca. 425 - 400 B.C. attributed to Kallimachos

Maenads were mythical women inspired by the god of wine, Dionysos, to abandon their homes and families and roam the mountains and forests, singing and dancing in a state of ecstatic frenzy. This figure, wearing an ivy wreath and carrying a thyrsos (fennel stalk) bedecked with ivy leaves and berries, moves forward, trancelike, her drapery swirling about her. She was copied from a famous relief of dancing maenads dated to the late fifth century B.C., when Euripides portrayed the manic devotees of Dionysos in his play the Bacchae.