Both
Pliny's Natural History and
Lucian's
Philopseudes described
Roman marbles of a
Diadumenos copied from Greek originals in
bronze, yet it was not recognized until 1878 that the Roman marble from
Vaison-la-Romaine (Roman Vasio) in the
British Museum and two others recreate the lost Polyclitan bronze original. Pliny recorded that the Polyclitan original fetched at auction the extraordinary price of a hundred
talents, an enormous sum in Antiquity, as
Adolf Furtwängler pointed out. Indeed, Roman marble copies must have abounded, to judge from the number of recognizable fragments and complete works, including a
head at the
Louvre,
a complete example at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, another complete example at the
Prado Museum, and another complete example of somewhat different character, the somewhat below lifesize Roman marble
Farnese Diadumenos at the
British Museum, which preserves the end of the ribband falling from the right hand.
Another version in the British Museum, slightly damaged but in otherwise reasonable condition, is from
Vaison in France. Freer versions were executed in reduced scale as bronze statuettes, and the head of Diadumenos-type appears on numerous Roman
engraved gems. The marble
Diadumenos from
Delos at the
National Museum, Athens (
right) has the winner's cloak and his quiver laid upon the tree stump, hinting that he is the victor in an archery match, with perhaps an implied reference to
Apollo, who was conceived, too, as an idealized youth. ==Modern reception==