THE VENUS OF SINUESSA

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In the Incaldana district in 1911, while earthworks were being carried out to plant a vineyard, the workers touched a kind of boulder with their pickaxes which later turned out to be a white marble. They continued to dig and to their amazement they saw the two pieces of a statue come out. The news immediately spread across the country. The owner of the land informed the mayor who warned the management of the Naples Museum . Two months passed without either the ministries or the superintendency giving any instructions; seeing this, the owner of the land on which the statue was found, was convinced that those pieces found were things of little value and sold them to an antique dealer for 500 lire. The antiquarian had the objects packed in some crates to take them to Rome. But the news of the sale came to the ear of the superintendent inspector who ordered the carabinieri to seize the boxes containing the archaeological material. All the finds were transported to the Naples Museum. Here an expert, prof. Spinazzoli, examined the fragments and immediately understood that they were all precious and that the two largest were parts of a single statue. He immediately had the two pieces cleaned and a statue came out which he called the " Venus of Sinuessa ", attributing it to Praxiteles , a great Greek sculptor. The statue was placed in the hall of the National Museum of Naples which collects the most precious statues of antiquity. The Venus of Sinuessa represents a miracle of the Greek statuary; it is devoid of head and arms, but even so it is of great value and perhaps adorned the temple of a villa in Sinuessa dedicated to the cult of Venus . This sculpture dates from the 4th century BC.  Some scholars believe that the villa that was adorned with this precious statue belonged to Cicero .