Footprints of small men at the sources of the Nile

Once again, the statuette in question is that of a dwarf. The ancients loved them: in Antiquity, being a dwarf was a token of otherness, sometimes of divinity. Figures of dwarfs made of bronze or terracotta were looked for by art connoisseurs, and for a wealthy Roman citizen, adorning one’s house walls with tiny beings frolicking in a verdant landscape was the epitome of good taste.

Our little man suffers from achondroplasia, a form of dwarfism characterized by a disproportionate head, short neck, enlarged muscles and short, crooked limbs (fig. 1)¹Dasen, Dwarfs, p. 8-11.. He also displays a grotesquely over-sized penis and several signs of savagery, like his untrimmed curly beard and his nakedness which, in the eyes of the ancients, pertained to populations dwelling in the far reaches of the known world. Other curious details, like very minute cavities scattered on the surface of his bald head, or an incised line crossing his forehead horizontally, are certainly meaningful.

If it was usual to show the body of small-sized persons as twisted by physical efforts, our small bronze man adopts an unexpected posture: stretched body, legs spread, with his torso tilted backwards and aside; his right arm is raised at head level, the hand grasping a thin element which is now lost. It looks as if he was about to strike an invisible adversary held in front of him with his left hand.

Dwarfs galore, from Herculaneum to Baltimore

As a proof of its popularity, this bearded and bellicose dwarf has plenty of twins and brothers, all of them displaying a very similar height (from 5.6 to 6 cm). Identified in public or private collections or on the art market, some of them are of unknown provenance, while others were found in situ²Stéphanie Boucher (Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79) had already listed several of them, to which new pieces can now be added.. Several are unpublished or lost, while some are only known from old drawings (fig. 2).

Found in situ

Even when their provenance is known, little can be said about archaeological contexts: due to the old age of their discovery, the records are always vague. Gaul was a privileged area for the distribution of these statuettes: one of them was found in situ in Tongeren, in Gallia Belgica³Liège, Grand Curtius Museum, Fonds IAL: Faider-Feytmans, Les bronzes romains, p. 107.; two are kept in the collections of the Cabinet des Médailles in Paris, one of them originally from the Rhône-Alpes region⁴Paris, Cabinet des Médailles, Inv. Bronze.59 and Inv. 52.10007.. Another, kept in Lyon, was uncovered in Arles⁵Lyon, Lugdunum Musée et Théâtres romains, Inv. br.075; Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79; Picon, Condamin, Boucher, “Recherches”, p. 156 (No. 125).. Prosper Mérimée has drawn a similar statuette, presumably found in Narbonne⁶Reinach, Répertoire, II, p. 564, No. 6 (Narbonne museum); Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79..

Italy is the other main place of discovery for these small bronzes: the one kept at the Walters Art Museum of Baltimore might come from Etruria⁷Baltimore, Walters Art Museum, Inv. 54.1115., like the one in Copenhagen, the one from the former Hartwig collection and the one at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston⁸Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79: the one from the former Hartwig collection (Rome), mentioned in Reinach, Répertoire, IV, p. 358, No. 3, and that from the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Inv. H. 247, come from Orvieto. The one in Boston, Inv. 96.669, is said to have been acquired in Florence.. Two of them are kept at the British Museum, one of them given by Sir William Hamilton who acquired many objects in Italy, and particularly in Campania, the other by Richard Payne Knight, who also travelled there several times⁹London, British Museum, Inv. 1772,0302.96 (object coll. Hamilton) and 1824,0431.1 (object coll. Payne Knight).. Another one, known by the count of Caylus, would come from Herculaneum¹⁰Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79: the dwarf known by Caylus, Recueil, VII, 32, 4, was preserved in his time at the “Cabinet d’Antiques” of Portici.. As to the unpublished statuettes preserved in Rome or Naples¹¹Naples, National Archaeological Museum, No. 5455; Rome, Capitoline Museums: Boucher, Recherches, p. 188, n. 79., their precise provenance is unclear, but one can reasonably assume that they were also found in Italy.

Without context

The piece from the former Schimmel collection¹²Hoffmann, in Muscarella, Ancient Art, No. 39. is slightly better preserved, as it displays the fragment of a slender element in the right hand, which became folded over time. Three other dwarfs are kept in museums, respectively in Budapest, Cassel and Vienna¹³Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts, Inv. 51.2855; Cassel museum: Bieber, Die antiken Skulpturen, p. 74, No. 239; Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Inv. AS VI 158: von Sacken, Die antiken Bronzen, p. 68, pl. xxvi, No. 9.. One can also mention those of the former collections Morven¹⁴Christie’s, live auction 1466, 8.06.2004, lot 489, The Morven Collection of Ancient Art. and von Faber-Castell¹⁵Cahn Auktionen AG, Auktion 8, 9.11.2013., as well as two pieces on the art market online¹⁶Invaluable, lot No. 102 and Artemis Gallery, auction 16.02.2024, lot 20a (with traces of silver inlay in the eyes).. The one in the Louvre, although much more rudimentary, stems from the same model¹⁷Paris, Louvre, Inv. Br 6098/N 7052.. So in total, we are now considering at least 24 of these fighting dwarfs, spread across the world, and divided into three groups¹⁸One could also add those mentioned by Bieber, Die antiken Skulpturen, p. 74, No. 239, formerly kept in Munich, Mainz and Karlsruhe, and that of the Charles Newton-Robinson collection, for which I was unable to check whether they pertain to the same iconographic type.: by far the largest, a group of statuettes which are perfectly identical by their dimensions, iconography, musculature and sex posture. And two isolated pieces: the one in the Louvre, which could be a copy, and the one from Narbonne, whose head displays a circlet adorned with lotus buds.

The geranomachy

An athlete to some, a wrestler, a harpooner or even a gladiator to others: since 2000 years, this amusing bronze grotesque persists in slaying a ghost. But what did this mysterious lost enemy look like? In antiquity, an ancient and popular theme implied a fight of dwarfs against cranes: the “geranomachy” (from the Greek geranos “crane”)¹⁹Ballabriga, “Les malheurs des Nains”, pass.. It is notably mentioned in a dramatic passage of the Iliad²⁰Homer, Iliad, III, 1-7: “Now when they were marshalled, the several companies with their captains, the Trojans came on with clamour and with a cry like birds, even as the clamour of cranes ariseth before the face of heaven, when they flee from wintry storms and measureless rain, and with clamour fly toward the streams of Ocean, bearing slaughter and death to Pigmy men, and in the early dawn they offer evil battle.” (translation A.T. Murray)., when the Trojans about to face the Greeks start shouting like cranes striking pygmies. Cranes like Trojans wreak havoc, and their shrieks are a harbinger of death.

The myth mentioned here brings into opposition the wading birds and small, “fist-sized” men, as their Greek name “pygmies” suggests (from the Greek pugmè “fist”), who were supposed to live on the banks of the Nile or in Ethiopia. As to the cranes, after spending the summer in the northern regions of Europe and Asia, they migrated southwards, and as for the regions known to the Greeks, to the south of Egypt, Ethiopia, and later India, Thrace or Anatolia²¹A very widespread myth, well-attested among other traditions, as in China or among American Indians, see Scobie, “The Battle”, pass.. A yearly and relentless confrontation between these adversaries of old, large migrating wading birds against short-sized settled farmers. The former would destroy the crop of the latter, who would revenge by eating the birds’ eggs and younglings. As a supreme insult, the little men lived in huts made of mud mixed with feathers and eggshells…²²Pliny, Natural History, VII, 26-27. From the 4^th century BC, the little crane-fighters were depicted as achondroplasic dwarfs with black African or Caucasian features, with or without beard, and often bald.

Bald people, beware of cranes

On one side, birds whose lightness and swiftness was stressed by Aesop, as well as their somewhat dull feathers and above all their pointed beak, which was either a help or a hindrance, according to the context²³Aesop, Fables: “The Geese and the Cranes” (swiftness); “The Peacock and the Crane” (dull feathers); “The Wolf and the Crane” (long sharp beak which can remove a bone stuck in a wolf’s throat); “The Fox and the Crane” (beak too sharp to eat with a plate).. On the other, miniature men from the south, remote from any civilization, who make do with improvised weapons to face the enemy from above. According to Hecataeus of Miletus, pygmies defended their crop by wearing horns, playing castanets or even dressing up as rams²⁴Hecataeus of Miletus, 1 F 328 Jacoby; Navarre, “Pygmaei”, p. 782.. Indeed, there was no “Iron Dome” to protect them from the nosedive attacks of the sharp-beaked waders.

From the onset, the tone is comical. The birds make good use of their size and beak to outwit their little adversaries. As a first example, a Mycenaean krater from Cyprus of the 14^th century BC shows two little men on a chariot fleeing from a gigantic long-necked bird (fig. 3)²⁵Nicosia, Cyprus Museum, from Enkomi; Mackowiak, “L’iconographie”, pass., which shows the iconographic continuity of the geranomachy along an axis passing through Egypt, Phoenicia, Cyprus and Rhodes. For the list of the first depictions of the myth, see Karageorghis, “Une représentation”, pass., and Mackowiak, “L’iconographie”, pass.. Also from Cyprus, a jug of the 7^th century BC shows a small stocky man shown full-face (a rare feature) next to a huge bird with pointed beak, directed towards his head (fig. 4)²⁶Nicosia, Cyprus Museum, 1938/IX-8/1; Karageorghis, “Une représentation”, p. 49-50.. Another example parodies the labor of Heracles and the Stymphalian birds, as it shows a tiny version of the divine hero about to strike a crane with his club (fig. 5)²⁷Louvre, pelike, inv. M 50, 375-350 BC.. On another vase, a bearded and naked dwarf is knocked down by a flying crane pecking at his bald head (fig. 6). If the birds are keen on attacking the pygmies’ head, the latter’s bare and plump buttocks, as well as exaggerated penis, are also choice targets, as seen on a vase from the Kabeirion of Thebes (fig. 7)²⁸Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Inv. SM 3159; Wolters, Bruns, Das Kabirenheiligtum, p. 108, M 7, pl. 29, fig. 3 and 4, and pl. 53, fig. 2; Dasen, Dwarfs, p. 185; Mackowiak, “L’iconographie”, pass., fig. 3.. A long-lasting iconographic tradition thus explains the multitude of tiny cavities on the bald head, or even the whole body, of our dwarfs. As for the cranes, their long and thin neck can also be a weakness: on the same vase, a Pygmy is shown biting into a bird’s neck while holding it with both hands (fig. 7)²⁹See also Wolters, Bruns, Das Kabirenheiligtum, p. 111, M 29, pl. 12, which is a simplified imitation of the vase Berlin SM 3159; Mackowiak, “L’iconographie”, fig. 4.. Sometimes a Pygmy, having seized the bird’s neck, is about to strike it with a spear.

So these boastful and vindictive dwarfs, who apparently keep something at a distance with their left arm while striking it with the right, can be understood in the light of more ancient depictions: their posture is that of a dwarf threatening a crane with a spear.

“Alexandrian” bronzes produced elsewhere

Our statuettes can be described as “Alexandrian” bronzes: small, very decorative objects inspired by exotic themes, such as “grotesques”, slaves, or black persons. Produced in the early Imperial period (late 1^st century BC – early 1^st century AD), they are inspired by topics which were very valued in Alexandria in the 3^rd and 2^ndcenturies.

A few Alexandrian statuettes, made of bronze or ivory, show what their models may have looked like. They display typically Egyptian features, such as the lotus circlet, a thin ornament circling the skullcap, with lotus buds above (among “our” dwarfs, only the one from Narbonne is equipped with it). In this regard, the closest piece to the series of fighting dwarfs is the one decorating the end of a handle, which shows a dwarf with lotus buds on his head, his left arm protected by a small shield (fig. 8)³⁰Bonn, Akademisches Kunstmuseum, inv. C 650; Dasen, “Pygmaioi”, p. 597, No. 34.. In Alexandria, the fighter often has the upper hand over the bird, which he tramples or even carries on his back after killing it (as shown by an ivory figure found in Etruria but originally from Alexandria, fig. 9)³¹Florence, Archaeological Museum; Dasen, “Pygmaioi”, p. 597, No. 39.. Our little bronzes probably derive from one of these Alexandrian types, or from a common model: the incised line on their forehead is probably a remnant of the ancient lotus bud circlet worn by the dwarfs from Alexandria.

The input of archaeometry

Fortunately, the exemplar from the Lyon museum could be analyzed: its alloy is the same as that of cast and wheel-turned ware³²Picon, Condamin, Boucher, “Recherches”, p. 156 (No. 125). Such metallographic analyses would be necessary to check whether the alloy of identical statuettes is the same or not., a speciality of Campanian workshops. Cast in a mold, the rough drafts were finished by chiseling while cold. The sculptor took care of details, such as the volume of the muscles, the streams of the beard, and various inlays. Indeed, as for all others, the hollowed pupils of the Fondation’s statuette were once inlaid with other materials. Several of them, notably the one at the Walters Art Museum, show black and white remains which still give them a particular appeal.

The migration of “Alexandrian” bronzes

The Roman customers interested in these “grotesque” statuettes were Italian: at least one of these dwarfs was uncovered in Campania. In the villas of this region, they could be associated with Nilotic scenes³³Barrett, “Recontextualizing”, p. 311, n. 72: scenes of geranomachy in houses II.9.2 and VIII,7.24; more general scenes showing Pygmies in houses V, 2; VII, 4, 51 and 31; VIII, 3, 13.. But these pieces also attracted connoisseurs in the whole Empire: in Gaul, or even in Pannonia, several of these dwarfs were found in areas not far from the main river navigation or terrestrial routes³⁴See Malaise, “À propos d’un buste-balsamaire”, pass.. Migrating dwarfs, so to speak.

Dr Isabelle Tassignon
Curator of the archaeology collection
Fondation Gandur pour l’Art, September 2024