Farnese Hercules

The Farnese Hercules in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples: a giant Roman marble signed by Glycon of Athens, copying a type by the Greek sculptor Lysippos. It was found in the Baths of Caracalla in Rome in the 1540s. Rather than the hero in action, it shows him exhausted after his labors, slumped on his club draped with the lion skin. Walk behind him, because his right hand, tucked at his back, holds the golden apples of the Hesperides, the prize of one of those labors, hidden from anyone standing in front.