Satala Aphrodite

and Nicopolis are shown. The head was found in 1872 by an old man named Youssouf who was digging in his field with a pickaxe, at a depth of around , near the village of , in what was once the Roman fortress of Satala, on the Kelkit River, north of Erzincan (then in the Ottoman Empire, now Turkey). The man uncovered fragments of a bronze statue, including the head and a hand. Castellani bribed Italian customs officials to export his collection. The acquisition was negotiated by Charles Thomas Newton, the museum's Keeper of Greek and Roman Antiquities. Newton appealed directly to British Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone, who agreed to provide £27,000 (£2 million in 2021) for Castellani's collection. The hand was donated by Castellani to the British Museum in 1875. The rest of the statue was never found, despite excavations by Alfred Biliotti and David George Hogarth. As of 2022, the fragments are displayed at the museum's Room 22 in a glass case over a ventilation grille. ==Description==

The head is high The back of the head and neck are severely damaged, Herbert Maryon described its creation as a good example of a technique which began in the 4th century BC: Maryon noted that besides the bridges, the inside of the head contains a number of fingermarks, which proves that the core "could not have been made first". The hair was cut into curls with a chisel. The left hand, long, which was found together with the head, holds a fragment of drapery. Lâtife Summerer suggested that the original statue was more than in height. ==Origin==

'' (1875), two years after its acquisition by the British Museum. The sculpture was initially dated to the 4th century BC, Dyfri Williams and Lucilla Burn believe it came from a Greek or Hellenistic cult statue. Olivier Rayet and Zhores Khachatryan believed it was either a replica of Aphrodite of Knidos or was inspired by it. Vrej Nersessian noted that it is "now generally recognized" that its style reflects that of Scopas rather than that of Praxiteles (the author of the Cnidian Aphrodite), because of the "low broad forehead, the intensely gazing deep-set eyes, and the large heavy nose, are all characteristic of the strongly marked individuality of that sculptor's heads". ==Subject==

's 1890 book Ayrarat, in which he identified the statue with Anahit. Babken Arakelyan found Artemis to be a more probable subject than Aphrodite. Some scholars have adopted this view, based on the proximity of the location of its discovery (Satala) to a major temple of Anahit in Erez (Eriza) in present-day Erzincan, around south of Satala. The temple at Erez, which "enjoyed great fame", was established, according to tradition, by Tigranes the Great in the first century BC and was the "wealthiest and most venerable in Armenia" per Cicero. Lethaby suggested that the head and hand "bear manifest evidence of violent destruction" of the "Greek statues of bronze brought to Armenia". Jones, Craddock, and Barker described it as an "eastern representation" of Aphrodite. Mardiros Ananikian wrote in The Mythology of All Races (1925) that it is a "Greek work (probably Aphrodite)" that was "worshiped by the Armenians." Soviet art historians wrote in 1962 that the head, found in Armenia's western regions, may represent the Armenian goddess Anahit. Lâtife Summerer argues that its discovery in northeastern Anatolia "supports its interpretation as Anaïtis." Robert H. Hewsen posited that it is "an obviously Hellenistic work" that is "surely not to be identified with any Armenian deity." Terence Mitford suggests that an identification as Anaitis (Anahita) is "wholly implausible". Zhores Khachatryan stated that "the Armenian origin of the statue still has to be proven". He believed that "it is more possible that it may be the statue of a Roman pagan goddess" as it was found near the site of a Roman camp inhabited during the time period of its assumed creation. Russell argued that Satala "appears to have been sufficiently important in ancient times to have been a religious centre, although there is nothing to suggest that the shrine was Armenian, or Zoroastrian" and suggested that it was a "Roman military shrine." ==Reception in the West==

drawn by T.E. Macklin (1892). ''Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine described it as a "unique example of a Greek bronze sculptured in a large commanding style [...] executed with all the feeling and skill which belongs to Greek art." Philip Gilbert Hamerton wrote that the head depicts a "simple and beautiful antique way of dressing the hair which was so suitable for plastic representation." while James R. Russell called it a piece of "very fine workmanship." Lucilla Burn, former Curator in the Greek and Roman department at the British Museum, wrote that the "exceptional quality of the surviving elements" suggest that the statue "must have formed a highly impressive figure." and in the title sequence of the 2017 film Call Me by Your Name''. ==Reception in Armenia==

in Yerevan (in 2017) banknote, in circulation from 1995 to 2005. depicting the head as goddess Anahit. It may have been imported to Armenia by the royal court, The head is portrayed in a mural crafted by (Vanik Khachatrian) in 1959, inside the Matenadaran in Yerevan, symbolizing Armenia's Hellenistic period. A faithful replica of the head has been on display at the History Museum of Armenia in Yerevan since 1968. The head appeared on two postage stamp issued by Armenia in 1992 and 2007 (the latter jointly with Greece), 5,000 Armenian dram banknotes in circulation from 1995 to 2005 (along with the Garni Temple), A 2000 painting, ''Still Life with Venus's Mask (alternatively titled Still Life with Anahit's Mask'') by Lavinia Bazhbeuk-Melikyan is inspired by the head. It currently hangs at the President's Residence in Yerevan. It is depicted on the logo of the . Armenian-American Peter Balakian authored a poem titled "Head of Anahit/British Museum", which was published in Poetry magazine in 2016. In 2025, a mural of Anahit based on the statue was painted on the building of the Yerevan State Institute of Theatre and Cinematography. Efforts to move to Armenia , a Soviet Armenian artist, proposed in 1966 to start talks with the British Museum to move the head to Armenia. In February 2012, three months prior to the 2012 Armenian parliamentary election, Armenia's Education and Science Minister Armen Ashotyan from the ruling Republican Party called for moving the fragments of the statue to Armenia. Ashotyan claimed that this was a personal and not a political initiative. One proponent of the campaign argued that the "sentimental value of the goddess Anahit's statue is worth far more to the Armenians than to the tourists and visitors of the British Museum". On March 7, 2012, some one hundred people, joined by Ashotyan, Zhores Khachatryan criticized the campaign as "pointless" and "populism that failed from the start." Exhibition in Armenia in 2025 Armenian authorities announced in January 2024 that the statue will be displayed in Armenia for the first time as a result of an agreement between the History Museum of Armenia and the British Museum. It was officially confirmed in April by Armenia's culture minister Zhanna Andreasyan and British ambassador John Gallagher. It was displayed at the History Museum in Yerevan as part of an exhibition entitled "Mother Goddess: From Anahit to Mary" from September 21, 2024, to March 21, 2025, later extended to April 10. Its transfer to the museum was live broadcast by Armenia's Public TV. Gallagher described it as a "landmark moment in BritishArmenian cultural ties". He said the statue has an "enormous significance". Armenian President Vahagn Khachaturyan, Parliament Speaker Alen Simonyan, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and his wife Anna Hakobyan attended the opening of the exhibition on September 21, the country's independence day. In a social media post, Pashinyan said, "Welcome back, Goddess". Armenian neopagans celebrated the "return" of Anahit with a ceremony at the Garni Temple. The exhibition attracted a total of 55,837 visitors. ==Exhibitions==

The head has been displayed at the 1967 International and Universal Exposition in Montreal; The original was exhibited at the History Museum of Armenia between September 21, 2024, and April 10, 2025. ==References==