Roman

As the symposium was a leisurely occasion, participants customarily reclined on couches (kline) while they drank and conversed. The headrest and footrest of kline were adorned with decorative elements, like this bronze horse head. The panther skin tied around the horse’s neck and the corkscrew curls of the mane are associated with the wine god Dionysus, making this bronze particularly suited to the wine-drinking revelry of the symposium. Although attributed to ancient Rome, this figure’s dramatic details — the flared nostrils, grooved jaw, open mouth, and twisted neck — reflect th heightened sense of realism and emotion in the art of Hellenistic Greece.