# Nile God Statue, Naples

The Statue of the Nile God (Italian: Statua del dio Nilo) is an Ancient Roman marble statue dating from the 2nd century AD.
It is located at Piazzetta Nilo (Largo Corpo di Napoli), at the start of via Nilo, in the quarter of the same name, and it is this statue that gives all their name. The church of Santa Maria Assunta dei Pignatelli faces the statue, and the Palazzo del Panormita is on the north flank. Two blocks east, along Via Benedetto Croce (part of the Decumano Inferiore commonly called Spaccanapoli) rises the church of San Domenico Maggiore.

## History

The statue represents the God of the Nile, recumbent with a cornucopia and lying on a sphinx. The statue was probably erected in the then Roman port city by Alexandrian merchants in the 2nd century. It was recovered, headless, in 1476, and was nicknamed Corpo di Napoli. The interpretation for the nickname is that the headless statue was thought to be a female representation of the city breastfeeding its children – hence the Corpo di Napoli ('body of naples').
It was placed upon a pedestal in 1657, and later that century a bearded head was sculpted. The sculptor of the head was Bartolomeo Mori. Later restoration was performed in the 18th-century by Angelo Viva.
In recent times, the statue was restored twice: First in 1993, and then in 2013 after the Carabinieri Command for the Protection of Cultural Heritage had recovered the head of the sphinx in Austria, which had disappeared in the 1950s. On 15 November 2014, a public ceremony for the completion of the restoration was held.
A higher quality version of the same topic, also Ancient Roman, is found in the Vatican Museums. Both statues are copies of an original from Alexandria, Egypt.

## Inscription

The inscription under the statue reads:
   Vetustissimam Nili Statuam Ab Alexandrinis Olim Ut Fama Est In Proximo Habitantibus Velut Patrio Numini Positam Deinde Temporum Injuria Corruptam Capiteque Truncatam Aediles Quidem Anni MDCLXVII Ne Quae Huic Regioni Celebre Nomen Fecit Sine Honore Jaceret Restituendam Conlocandamque Aediles Vero Anni MDCCXXXIV Fulciendam Novoque Pigrammate Ornandum Curavere Placido Princ. Dentice Praef. Ferdinandus Sanfelicius Marcellus Caracciolus Petrus Princeps De Cardenas Princ. Cassan. Dux Carinar. Augustinus Viventius Antonius Gratiosus. Agnell. Vassallus Sec.
The earlier 1667 inscription of this statue – referenced in the current inscription – is recorded in travel writings of Johann Georg Keyßler (mid 18th-century) still noting a crocodile, which is absent today:
   Vetustissimam Nili Statuam vides, At capite nuper auctam non suo Hoc scilicet Nili fatum est Suum quod occulat caput Alieno spectari; Ne tamen observandum antiquitatis monumentum Quod proximæ Nobilium sedi nomen fecit. Statuæ Truncus jaceret ignobilis Elegantiori exornatum cultu Urbani Ædiles voluerunt Anno D. MDCLVII
   You see the very old statue of the Nile, But the newly enlarged head is not his own This, of course, has been his fate Because he hides his head To be seen with a stranger's; Furthermore, so that this monument of antiquity That made the name for the nearby noble Seggios Would not lie as the ignoble speckles of the statue The Ædiles ordered it to be more elegantly decorated In the year of our Lord 1657

## Gallery

* Detail of the Nile God's head
* The alternate version located in the Vatican Museums
* Statue in the first half of the 20th-century